Analysis
Smart, independent reporting on Turkey's politics, economy and foreign affairs.
There's a Turkish saying for describing one misfortune piling on another: 'What happened to us didn't even happen to the boiled chicken'. The last three years for opposition leaders Özgür Özel and Ekrem İmamoğlu, and the 'Change Movement' they lead, bring that saying to mind.
The long-awaited and kept-under-wraps framework bill that will start the return and release of PKK members was finally submitted to parliament, two years after the process was announced.
Coal miners from Doruk Mining, a subsidiary of Yıldızlar SSS Holding that made the headlines earlier this year, held a new sit-in protest in Ankara, demanding years of unpaid severance and termination benefits as promises were not kept.
The opposition's advantage in Istanbul's Municipal Council is decreasing while the ruling AKP and MHP are increasing their numbers.
Although the Yeni Party did not sign the framework bill designed to advance the Kurdish peace process, some of its MPs are expected to support the law in the General Assembly, since some of its MPs contributed to the commission in the parliament under the CHP banner.
Yeni Party Chair Özgür Özel faces a new effort aimed at removing his immunity from prosecution, one that looks more serious than 60 other such applications already filed in parliament.
The scandal surrounding Özyurt Arms is no longer limited to unauthorized ammunition production but also about corruption in the media.
The Yeni Party became Turkey's main opposition party soon after its founding, with 91 lawmakers among its founders. Mayors and municipal council members continued to join the party, while the crackdown against its supporters continued at full speed across the country.
The framework bill that will advance the Kurdish peace process through the return of militants has reached its final stage, but its content was withheld from all parties, including the DEM Party, until the last moment.
The answer is no. Because seven years after breaking away from the AKP to found the Gelecek Party, it has become clear that the party itself has no future. Reading between the lines of his announcement that he will dissolve the party and step away from politics, one senses his acknowledgment that 'things are no longer working.'
Turkish industrialists criticized a new United States’ decision to impose a 12.5% tariff on Turkish products under Section 301, warning that the move places key export sectors, especially textiles and apparel, at a severe disadvantage.
The government plans to privatize state-operated highways and bridges under a 25-year transfer of operating rights model, while officials weigh whether to sell the assets as a single bundle or divide them into separate packages.