Analysis
Smart, independent reporting on Turkey's politics, economy and foreign affairs.
The unemployment rate remained slightly above 8% in the first quarter of the year, according to TurkStat — yet independent surveys drawing on the same data continue to challenge the official picture.
Turkey's inflation and high cost of living show no sign of easing. A new Central Bank survey points to rising price expectations — coming just days after the bank officially revised its own forecasts upward.
A mechanism between Turkey and Germany that had been halted over a decade ago came back to life on May 18, when Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan met with his German counterpart Johann Wadephul in Berlin.
Diplomacy, at its best, is the art of managing appearances. At its worst, it is the art of mistaking those appearances for reality.
The way Donald Trump was received in Beijing by Xi Jinping showed China’s increased power and confidence in its relations with the US. Trump’s flattery of his host was a clear indication that China will no longer be regarded as an underdog that Trump can push around with arbitrary tariff increases.
A city’s cultural field does not stop at its administrative boundary. If Ankara reveals itself in layers, some of its most telling ones begin once the city has thinned into road, valley and plateau.
A private company near Çorum with a history of only six years, ARCA Defense, has become the hidden leader of the sector.
A wave of resignations has swept through Halk TV, a broadcaster with close ties to the main opposition CHP, as prominent on-air personalities and editors publicly cited internal grievances as their reason for leaving.
Preparations for the COP31 climate summit, set to be held in Antalya on Nov. 9-20, are fueling controversy over costs, procurement methods and forced land seizures.
A sweeping operation targeting illegal online gambling and money laundering networks led to the detention of 128 people across 21 provinces on May 14, including polarizing media figure Rasim Ozan Kütahyalı and two senior executives from İş Bank, one of Turkey's largest private banks.
Ankara is often described by those who do not know it well as a grey city. This is unfair, though not entirely mysterious. A city that must constantly perform seriousness is rarely forgiven for having charm. Yet Ankara’s charm is real. It is private, reveals itself slowly, and almost always just outside the official frame. It is a city of dry light, hard hills, old stones, republican geometry, Ottoman shadows, Roman fragments, Seljuk craft and streets that remember more than they are prepared to explain. This is why Ankara deserves a cultural diplomacy route, a way of showing visitors not only what the city proudly displays, but also what it half-remembers, neglects, misnames, hides or leaves to survive behind other buildings.
A historic sanatorium on Heybeliada — the island also known as Halki — is set to be transferred to the Directorate of Religious Affairs for the second time, after a previous transfer was annulled by a court. The move comes as the same island is at the center of another religious question: the possible reopening of the Greek Orthodox Halki Seminary.