The longtime leader appointed an internationally respected former banker as finance and treasury minister and on Friday named a former co-CEO of a U.S.-based bank as head of the central bank.

But lingering uncertainty over Erdogan’s economic direction and an apparent move to loosen government controls of foreign currency exchanges have led Turkey‘s currency to plunge to record lows against the U.S. dollar this week.

The Turkish lira has now weakened by around 20% against the dollar since the start of the year. It has raised fears of even higher prices for people already struggling to afford basics like housing and food amid high inflation.

“I am anxious. I am unhappy. Soon my income won’t pay the rent,” said Sureyya Usta, a 63-year-old who lives in Ankara.

Here’s a look at the falling value of the lira, what lies ahead for the economy and how people have been affected:

ERDOGAN’S ECONOMIC POLICIES

Turkey has been plagued by a currency crisis and skyrocketing inflation since 2021, which economists say are the result of Erdogan’s unorthodox belief that raising interest rates will increase inflation.

Conventional economic thinking — and the approach being taken by central banks around the world — calls for the opposite: rate hikes to control price spikes.

Erdogan has exerted pressure on Turkey’s central bank to lower borrowing costs.

The bank has cut its key policy rate from around 19% in 2021 to 8.5% now, even as inflation hit a staggering 85% last year. Inflation eased to 39.5% last month, according to official figures, but an independent group says the true number is more than double that.

In other policy considered to be unorthodox, economists say the government aggressively intervened in the markets to prop up the lira ahead of the elections, depleting Turkey’s foreign currency reserves to keep the exchange rate under control.

“Pressure over the lira had been high for some time, but excessive interventions by the central bank was preventing” the currency from skyrocketing in recent weeks or months, said Ozlem Derici Sengul, an economist at the Istanbul Spinn Consultancy.

A RETURN TO ‘RATIONAL GROUND’?

Hours after being sworn in, Erdogan announced that Mehmet Simsek, a former Merrill Lynch banker who had previously served as his finance minister and deputy prime minister, would return to the Cabinet after a five-year break from politics.

Simsek said Turkey had no other option but to return to “rational ground.” In a sign that Erdogan’s new administration might pursue more conventional economic policies, Simsek also said there were no “shortcuts or quick fixes” but vowed to oversee Turkey’s finances with “transparency, consistency, accountability and predictability.”

In another sign, Erdogan on Friday appointed Hafize Gaye Erkan to lead the central bank, taking over from the current chief who has championed rate cuts since 2021. Erkan, a former co-CEO of a U.S.-based bank, becomes Turkey’s first woman central bank governor.

Economists say, however, that it’s not clear to what extent Erdogan, who has ruled the country with a tight grip, will give Erkan and Simsek free rein.

“The markets are not convinced yet” of Erdogan’s return to traditional policies, Sengul said. There are uncertainties over whether Erdogan will “allow unlimited independence to the central bank and other institutions — or have another strategy,” she said.

WHY IS TURKEY’S CURRENCY FALLING?

The Turkish lira tumbled to record lows against the dollar this week, first falling 7% on Wednesday and then 1.6% on Friday.

Economists say the sharp slide earlier in the week resulted from the government loosening its controls over the currency following Simsek’s appointment. However, the plunge may have been steeper than what it had anticipated.

The lira weakened by a limited 0.5% on Thursday amid reports that state banks were asked to resume selling foreign currency to prop up the currency. On Friday, the lira depreciated to another all-time low of 23.54 to the dollar.

“Loose interventions, combined with some uncertainty, created an excessive depreciation in the lira in one day,” Sengul said about the Wednesday drop. “The banks are currently intervening in the exchange market, that’s why we will not have another 7% depreciation.”

HOW ARE PEOPLE AFFECTED?

High inflation is pinching households and businesses with costlier groceries, utility bills and more. A weaker currency means Turkey, which is dependent on imported raw materials, will have to pay more for everything from energy to grain that are priced in dollars.

Usta, the 63-year-old from Ankara, works at a firm that sells cash registry machines to boost her retirement pension but still struggles to pay her living expenses amid high inflation.

She is worried that this week’s sharp decline in the lira will lead to further price increases and even more financial uncertainty for her.

“I keep cutting back and cutting back so that I can afford to live, so I can pay for gas and electricity. But how much more can I cut back?” Usta said. “I’ve forgotten about going to the theater and the cinema — or going out to meet friends.”

Usta says her rent doubled earlier this year, but the owner wants to increase it again. Moving out isn’t an option because rents have skyrocketed even in her low-income neighborhood, she says.

Sengul, the economist, says the one-day currency shock is unlikely to have a huge impact. If, however, the depreciation is not contained, she warns, “market pricing behavior will dramatically deteriorate.”

Source: abcnews

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During Erdoğan’s 20 years as the leader of Turkey, his government has consolidated power and imprisoned critics. His government has also persecuted and disenfranchised the country’s Kurdish minority by overturning the results of local elections won by pro-Kurdish parties, killing hundreds of Kurdish civilians in the city of Cizre in 2016, and imprisoning and beating pro-Kurdish members of parliament. 

Turkey has been in an economic crisis since 2018 that is largely the result of Erdoğan’s unorthodox policies. He has refused to raise interest rates to rein in inflation, leading the Turkish lira to lose 44 per cent of its value in 2021.

Inflation surged to over 85 per cent last year while rents in some cities rose more than 100 per cent. Poor construction practices and a lack of government oversight amid a building boom worsened the devastation of the February earthquakes that killed 50,000. Georgia and Armenia now have higher per capita incomes than neighbouring provinces of Turkey and could surpass the Turkish average within five years. 

When it comes to foreign policy, Erdoğan has pursued an interventionist approach, making Turkey a key actor in Syria, Libya, Iraq, Kosovo, Ukraine, and Nagorno-Karabakh. Even as he causes headaches for Brussels, Turkey remains an indispensable partner for NATO.  

The EU and NATO 

Turkey applied to join the then European Economic Community in 1987, and the European Council granted European Union candidate status to Turkey in 1999. Accession negotiations began in 2005, but in 2018, the Council said they had reached a standstill in light of “continuing and deeply worrying backsliding on the rule of law and on fundamental rights” under Erdoğan.

Unlike other EU candidates, Turkey was never granted visa liberalisation with the Schengen Area—a source of continued frustration within the country. Kılıçdaroğlu campaigned on securing visa-free travel for Turkish citizens.  

Relations with Turkey remain vital for the EU, however, as two member states (Greece and Bulgaria) share borders with Turkey. Turkey hosts 3.6 million Syrian refugees and largely controls the flow of many refugees and migrants from the Middle East to the EU.  

Most of the EU is also an ally of Turkey in NATO, and Turkey has the second largest armed forces in the alliance after only the United States. However, in recent years, major schisms have emerged within the alliance as Erdoğan has broken with the rest of the bloc over admitting new members and military interventions. 

The US and many other NATO members support a coalition of ethnic militias known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (AANES). The SDF played a major role in defeating the Islamic State (IS) and a component Kurdish militia (YPG) helped save Yezidis in Iraq from genocide by IS. 

Turkey, however, claims the YPG, and thus the SDF, is linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is classifies as a terrorist organisation. Erdoğan has supported the Syrian al-Qaeda affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra and Islamist rebel groups sanctioned by the US for war crimes as proxies in Syria. The Turkish military and its proxies have launched incursions into the AANES that have allegedly seen widespread war crimes and the ethnic cleansing of Kurds and other minorities. Turkish airstrikes on the SDF in Syria have come within 300 metres of US troops, and the US and other NATO members have condemned the incursions and warned they threaten the ability of the SDF to keep 10,000 captured IS fighters in detention. 

After Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, EU members Finland and Sweden applied to join NATO. Erdoğan, however, stonewalled the accession of both countries over demands that they stop Quran burnings and deport Kurdish rights activists with ties to the YPG, including those who are Swedish citizens and asylum seekers.  

Officials in Helsinki and Stockholm have said the deportation of their citizens and asylum-seekers violate their laws and that Quran burning is protected as free speech. Erdoğan eventually let Finland join the alliance after he said it addressed Turkey’s concerns about Kurdish groups, but he has still refused to allow Sweden to join.  

Turkey’s actions in Syria spawned calls to boot it from NATO, and its refusal to allow Sweden to enter has generated even more calls to eject Ankara unless it changes its tune. 

Ukraine 

In Ukraine, the same Turkish Bayraktar TB2 drones used by the Turkish government to kill Kurds are celebrated for their role helping to repel Russian forces. Baykar Defence, the Turkish defence contractor led by Erdoğan’s son-in-law, donated drones to Ukraine that have subsequently become the subject of songs and memes as a symbol of resistance.  

Erdoğan has voiced support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and the rights of Crimean Tatars—a Muslim Turkic indigenous group in Crimea that has faced discrimination since Russia illegally annexed the peninsula. Turkey, however, maintains better relations with Moscow than most of NATO and has continued to welcome Russian business even as the rest of the bloc sanctioned it. Turkey used its relative neutrality to secure a deal that allowed Ukraine to export its grain.  

Despite its rights violations and the headaches it gives even its closest allies, it is unlikely to withdraw from NATO anytime soon. Erdoğan will continue to project Turkish power to maintain his country’s status as a regional power with sway around the Mediterranean and Eurasia in hopes of securing concessions from the EU on visa liberalisation and from NATO on the sale of coveted F-16 fighter aircraft from Washington.

Erdoğan is likely to eventually allow Sweden to join NATO in exchange for more good behaviour in Ukraine and F-16s, which will almost certainly be used by Turkey to strike Kurdish areas of Syria and Iraq. Brussels and Ankara will continue to see what concessions may be extracted from each other as new challenges arise during Erdoğan’s next term.  

Source: Emerging Europe

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President Tayipp Erdogan has been speaking about the necessity of promoting dialogue for Turkey’s accession to the European Union.

Ankara opened talks on the issue with Brussels 18-years-ago, but they have been at a virtual standstill for a long time.

Now though, Mr. Erdogan insists it is necessary to increase contacts at all levels in the direction of Turkey’s full membership to the EU – which he said, has ‘great strategic value for Europe’.

During a phone conversation with Charles Michel, the president of the European Council, Erdogan underlined the importance of updating the customs union agreement between Ankara and Brussels and strengthening bilateral cooperation on migration and counterterrorism.

Re-elected in May

Since winning re-election on May 28, Mr. Erdogan has had his plate full.

Earlier this week, he vowed to submit a new proposal for amending the constitution to the parliament. His ruling AKP party has been working on a draft charter since 2022.

The current constitution, introduced nearly forty years ago, has been amended 19 times since 1982.

Separately, new figures show Turkey’s annual inflation slowed to 39.59 percent in May, the lowest level since December 2021. 

However,  the Turkish currency hit an all-time low against the U.S. dollar this week. The new Finance Minister has vowed to fight inflation and restore investor confidence.

Source: Vatican News

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Turkey’s pro-Kurdish parties have reaffirmed their support for opposition unity candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu in this weekend’s run-off presidential election, one day after conveying their anger at a deal he struck on the expulsion of migrants in order to win the endorsement of a far right party.

Their discomfort at maintaining their backing for Kilicdaroglu was evident in the fact that they did not name him in their May 25 statement on whom they would advise their supporters to vote for in the May 28 showdown. Kurds make up around a fifth of Turkey’s 85mn-strong population and, given the fanning of nationalism seen during the campaigning, will fear a renewed crackdown under the regime, should it emerge unscathed from the election as most analysts expect it to do.

The alternative to Kilicdaroglu in the runoff is Turkey’s leader of two decades Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who officially defeated Kilicdaroglu in the election first round on May 14 by 49.5% to 44.9% and is widely expected to secure re-election in Sunday’s head to head.

The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and its Green Left (YSP) ally explained on May 25 that they were still seeking a change of government in the runoff and would thus not change their stance on whom to vote for.

HDP co-chair Pervin Buldan told a news conference that party members would vote to end Erdogan’s “one-man regime”, which she referred to as a “freak regime”, saying: “The freak regime created by Erdogan and his partners is the cause of the societal problems that are being experienced. What will be voted on May 28 is whether this freak regime will continue or not.”

Kilicdaroglu on May 24 announced a deal with the anti-immigrant Victory Party (ZP), which secured him their endorsement. The ZP won 2.2% of votes in the parliamentary election that ran in parallel with the presidential poll first-round vote.

To secure the accord, Kilicdaroglu agreed to an article expressing support for the regime policy of replacing mayors with state-appointed trustees where a court ruled that they had terrorism links. Most HDP mayors elected in 2019 have been replaced by such officials.

Buldan was also critical of election campaign rhetoric in which migrants are used for political purposes, saying: “The refugee and migrant problem can only be solved with a strong struggle for peace against policies of war.”

The six-party Nation Alliance led by Kilicdaroglu previously said it would end the practice of replacing mayors with government-appointed trustees.

The endorsement of Kilicdaroglu by ZP leader Umit Ozdag goes some way to countering the endorsement Erdogan received on May 22 from Sinan Ogan, the presidential candidate of a ZP-led far right alliance, who came third in the first-round vote with 5.2% support.

Source: Intelli News

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Turks voted on Sunday in a presidential runoff that could see Tayyip Erdogan extend his rule into a third decade and persist with Turkey’s increasingly authoritarian path, muscular foreign policy and unorthodox economic governance.

Erdogan, 69, defied opinion polls and came out ahead with an almost five-point lead over his rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu in the first round on May 14. But he fell just short of the 50% needed to avoid a runoff, in a race with profound consequences for Turkey itself and global geopolitics.

His unexpectedly strong showing amid a deep cost of living crisis, and a win in parliamentary elections for a coalition of his conservative Islamist-rooted AK Party (AKP), the nationalist MHP and others, buoyed the veteran campaigner who says a vote for him is a vote for stability.

Polls closed at 5 p.m. (1400 GMT) after opening at 8 a.m. (0500 GMT). The outcome is expected to start becoming clear by early evening local time. Polling stations were reportedly quieter in many places than two weeks ago, when turnout was 89%.

The election will decide not only who leads Turkey, a NATO-member country of 85 million, but also how it is governed, where its economy is headed after its currency plunged to one-tenth of its value against the dollar in a decade, and the shape of its foreign policy, which has seen Turkey anger the West by cultivating ties with Russia and Gulf states.

Erdogan supporters gathered at a school near his home on the Asian side of Istanbul where he voted around midday (0900 GMT), before shaking hands and talking with the crowd.

“With God’s permission he will win. The country has many problems but if anyone can solve them, he can,” said Nuran, who came to vote with her three-year-old daughter.

In Ankara, 32-year-old Gulcan Demiroz said she hoped the vote would bring change and that her friends would otherwise go abroad, as she was considering doing, for a better life.

“This country deserves better. We need a collective of minds, not a powerful, cold, distant man who rules single handedly,” said Gulcan, who works in the textile industry, after voting for Kilicdaroglu.

Kilicdaroglu, 74, voted in Ankara. He is the candidate of a six-party opposition alliance, and leads the Republican People’s Party (CHP) created by Turkey’s founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. His camp has struggled to regain momentum after trailing Erdogan in the first round.

The initial election showed larger-than-expected support for nationalism – a powerful force in Turkish politics which has been hardened by years of hostilities with Kurdish militants, an attempted coup in 2016 and the influx of millions of refugees from Syria since war began there in 2011.

Turkey is the world’s largest refugee host, with some 5 million migrants, of whom 3.3 million are Syrians, according to Interior Ministry data.

Third-place presidential candidate and hardline nationalist Sinan Ogan said he endorsed Erdogan based on a principle of “non-stop struggle (against) terrorism”, referring to pro-Kurdish groups. He achieved 5.17% of the vote.

Umit Ozdag, leader of the anti-immigrant Victory Party (ZP), announced a deal declaring ZP’s support for Kilicdaroglu, after the CHP leader said he would repatriate immigrants. The ZP won 2.2% of votes in the parliamentary election.

A survey by pollster Konda put support for Erdogan at 52.7% and Kilicdaroglu at 47.3% after distributing undecided voters. The survey was carried out on May 20-21, before Ogan and Ozdag revealed their endorsements.

Another key is how Turkey’s Kurds, at about a fifth of the population, will vote.

The pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party endorsed Kilicdaroglu in the first round but, after his move to win nationalist votes, it did not explicitly name him and just urged voters to reject Erdogan’s “one-man regime”.

‘MORE ERDOGAN’

Turkey’s president commands fierce loyalty from pious Turks who once felt disenfranchised in secular Turkey and his political career has survived the failed coup and corruption scandals.

“Turkey has a longstanding democratic tradition and a longstanding nationalist tradition, and right now it’s clearly the nationalist one that’s winning out,” said Nicholas Danforth, Turkey historian and non-resident fellow at think tank ELIAMEP. “Erdogan has fused religious and national pride, offering voters an aggressive anti-elitism.”

“People know who he is and what his vision for the country is, and it seems a lot of them approve.”

Erdogan has taken control of most of Turkey’s institutions and sidelined liberals and critics. Human Rights Watch, in its World Report 2022, said Erdogan’s government has set back Turkey’s human rights record by decades.

The domination of the country’s media by pro-government TV stations and newspapers gave Erdogan a major advantage over his opponent in the election campaign, with his frequent speeches all covered live while his rival received limited coverage.

In February, earthquakes killed more than 50,000 people and devastated southern Turkey and this had been expected to add to Erdogan’s challenge in the elections. However, his AKP remained dominant across that region on May 14.

But if Erdogan goes, it will be largely because Turks have seen their prosperity, equality and ability to meet basic needs decline, with inflation topping 85% last October.

Kilicdaroglu, a former civil servant, has pledged to roll back much of Erdogan’s changes to Turkish domestic, foreign and economic policies.

He would also revert to the parliamentary system of governance, from Erdogan’s executive presidential system, narrowly passed in a referendum in 2017.

Source: Saltwire

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The Turkish central bank’s monetary policy committee (MPC) on May 25 held its benchmark rate at 8.50%, the authority said in a statement (chart).

Turkey’s central bank and its policy rate, however, remain idle on the sidelines. The Erdogan regime conducts its monetary policy via macroprudential measures and non-capital controls. 

Almost every day more macroprudential measures or non-capital controls, or amendments to already amended measures, are circulated by news services following briefings given by unnamed sources. Even the treasury departments at Turkey’s banks can hardly keep up with each announced move.

On May 3, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TUIK, or TurkStat) said that Turkey’s official consumer price index (CPI) inflation was recorded at 44% y/y in April compared to 51% y/y in March.

On May 4, the central bank left its expectation for end-2023 official inflation unchanged at 22% (upper boundary: 27%).

The guidance was based on the assumption that the lira would not experience another crash. As of May 25, the USD/TRY rate in the interbank market was up by 2% to TRY 19.93 from 19.49 on May 4 while free market prices at the Grand Bazaar in Istanbul hovered in the 21s.

The lira has lately seen more record-breaking decline. The latest USD/TRY all-time record in the interbank market, set on May 23, stands at TRY 20.32.

Amid the booming lira supply and hard currency outflows via record trade deficits, officials only keep the lira from entering into a nosedive by coercing bankers into blocking and gumming up domestic FX demand. Also supportive are unidentified financial inflows and support from “friendly countries”.

Another lira calamity would come as no surprise. It could happen at any time. Turks have been building up cryptocurrency, cars and gold as assets to prepare themselves for an upcoming storm.

The FX-protected deposits scheme (KKM) introduced by the regime reached $121.5bn as of May 19. The KKM has a 23% share in total deposits while the FX-linked deposits’ share stands at 40%.

The central bank’s net FX reserves have, meanwhile, fallen into negative territory for the first time since 2002. Gross reserves declined by $25bn in the last two months to stand at $102bn as of May 19 while net reserves excluding swaps broke a fresh record with minus $60bn.

The central bank’s net FX position also stands at a fresh record of minus $76bn.

To break the FX demand, the government has lately allowed local banks to offer higher lira deposit rates. As of May 19, the weighted average lira deposit rate with maturities up to three months reached 30.47%.

On Sunday May 28, Turkey will hold its second-round presidential vote runoff, with incumbent Recep Tayyip Erdogan up against opposition unity candidate Kemal Kilicdaroglu.

Observers expect Erdogan to declare on the evening of May 28 that he has been re-elected. The so-called opposition in Turkey never challenges the election results, instead playing an active role to legitimise the officially presented outcome. The theatre of democracy in Turkey continues.

Though Turkey does have a habit for surprises, it currently seems that the Erdogan regime will still be in place on May 29.

In the period ahead, a currency devaluation looks a must due to the re-emerging side effects of the overvalued lira and the fact that the Erdogan regime will be in a position to find some FX supply. If the unidentified flows and the friendly country channels do not satisfy requirements, rate hikes could be on the cards.

On June 22, the MPC is set to hold its next rate-setting meeting.

The turbulence-free mood on the global markets, meanwhile, remains intact although the US government’s debt ceiling showdown between the Biden administration and the Republicans has not yet been overcome. So far, a “sell in May, go on holiday” market shake-up has not occurred.

Turkey’s five-year credit default swaps (CDS) have fallen below the 700-level, while the yield on the Turkish government’s 10-year eurobonds remains above the 10%-level.

On May 24, some unnamed sources told Bloomberg that Turkey’s central bank has asked some local lenders to buy the country’s dollar bonds to prevent a spike in CDS.

Source: Intelli News

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Preliminary results in Turkey’s presidential runoff vote on Sunday showed President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ahead of his rival as the leader fights to stretch his rule into a third decade.

With 71.45% of the ballots counted, Erdogan received 54.37% of the votes, according to unofficial preliminary results published by state-run Anadolu agency, while opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu received 45.63%.

Voter turnout is 85.07%, according to Anadolu.

Earlier on Sunday, Erdogan asked his supporters “to stay at the ballot boxes until results are finalized.”

“Now is the time to protect the will of the people which we hold in the highest esteem,” Erdogan wrote on his Twitter account.

Every Turkish citizen has a right to watch the vote count at their ballot boxes, and doing so has become something of a tradition in Turkey.

Spokesman for Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), Faik Oztrak, seemingly warned Erdogan against carrying out any speeches to supporters until the official election results have been announced.

“No one should muddy the waters with balcony speeches,” Oztrak said on Sunday, referring to Erdogan’s traditional election-night style speech. “We’re sending a clear warning: No one should try to make this into a ‘fait accompli’ until the results are final.”

“I say this with emphasis: we’ll protect the will of the nation until the end and we will win,” he said.

Erdogan is going head-to-head against Kilicdaroglu, a 74-year-old bureaucrat and leader of the left-leaning CHP.

In the first round of voting on May 14, Erdogan secured a nearly five-point lead over Kilicdaroglu but fell short of the 50% threshold needed to win. 

The president’s parliamentary bloc won a majority of seats in the parliamentary race on the same day. 

Erdogan cast his vote at a voting center in Istanbul on Sunday. “This is a first in Turkish democratic history,” he said.

“Turkey, with nearly 90% participation in the last round, showed its democratic struggle beautifully and I believe it will do the same again today,” he added.

Kilicdaroglu cast his vote in Ankara, telling reporters: “In order to get rid of the oppression and to get rid of this authoritarian leadership, to bring real democracy and freedom, I call on all citizens to go vote and to stand by the ballot boxes after.

“Because [the] election was held under hardships, all sorts of black propaganda and slander was used but I trust in the common sense of the people.”

Electoral authorities said voting was passing “without any issues” and that results should come sooner than in the first round.

Last week, third-place candidate Sinan Ogan, who won 5% of the first-round vote, publicly endorsed Erdogan, further boosting the strongman leader’s chances of winning Sunday’s second and final presidential round. 

Many polls had incorrectly predicted that Kilicdaroglu would lead in the May 14 vote, which saw a high turnout of nearly 90% across the country. 

Six opposition groups had formed an unprecedented unified bloc behind Kilicdaroglu to try to wrest power from Erdogan.

The opposition has described the election as a last stand for Turkish democracy, accusing Erdogan of hollowing out the country’s democratic institutions during his 20-year rule, eroding the power of the judiciary and repressing dissent.

Erdogan also faces headwinds from a floundering economy and a shambolic initial response to a catastrophic earthquake on February 6 which claimed more than 50,000 lives in Turkey and neighboring Syria.

The government acknowledged its “mistakes” in its rescue operation and apologized to the public. 

Erdogan’s critics also spotlighted loose construction standards presided over by the ruling AK party, which turbocharged a construction boom since the early 2000s, and exacerbated the death toll. They also argued that the earthquake response underscored Erdogan’s alleged hollowing out of government entities in his bid to consolidate power. 

The country’s financial crisis — which saw the currency plummet and prices soar — is also partially blamed on Erdogan’s policies. The president suppressed interest rates leaving inflation unfettered, critics argued.  

But electoral results on May 14 showed continued support for the president in his conservative strongholds, including in the devastated earthquake zone.

In an interview with CNN’s Becky Anderson last week, Erdogan vowed to double down on his unorthodox economic policies, arguing that interest rates and inflation were “positively correlated.”

He also hailed his relationship with Russian President Vladimir Putin as “special” and said he would continue to block Sweden’s access to NATO, despite Western criticism that he was obstructing a unified front against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

Erdogan, who controls the second-largest army in NATO, accused Sweden of harboring Kurdish terror groups and has preconditioned Stockholm’s accession on the extradition of wanted individuals. Sweden has refused Turkey’s repeated requests to extradite individuals Ankara describes as terrorists, arguing that the issue can only be decided by Swedish courts.

Since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the Turkish strongman has emerged as a key powerbroker, adopting a crucial balancing act between the two sides, widely known as “pro-Ukrainian neutrality.”

He helped broker a key agreement known as the Black Sea Grain Corridor Initiative that unlocked millions of tons of wheat caught up in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, averting a global hunger crisis. The agreement was extended for another two months last Wednesday, one day before it was set to expire.

Source: CNN

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Turkey and Hungary are the only NATO members that are yet to ratify the accession of Finland and Sweden.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has suggested that Ankara could soon ratify Finland’s application to join NATO and allow the country to join the military alliance separately from Sweden.

Alarmed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year ago, Finland and Sweden abandoned decades of nonalignment and applied to join the alliance. All 30 NATO members have approved their applications, and 28 have ratified their accession. Only Turkey and Hungary have yet to do so.

Turkey’s government accuses Sweden of being too soft on groups that it considers to be “terror” organisations and existential threats, including Kurdish groups.

Turkish officials have also been angered by a series of demonstrations in Sweden, including a protest by an anti-Islam activist who burned the Quran outside the Turkish embassy.

Ankara has said, however, that it has fewer problems with Finland’s membership.

Asked by reporters on Wednesday whether Turkey could ratify Finland’s membership after a visit by Finnish President Sauli Niinisto this week, Erdogan responded: “God willing, if it is for the best.”

“Whatever the process is, the process will function,” Erdogan said. “We will do our part. We will keep our promise. We will meet with the president on Friday and fulfil the promise we made.”

Niinisto is scheduled to arrive in Turkey along with Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto on Thursday when the two officials will tour areas affected by devastating earthquakes that hit parts of Turkey and Syria last month.

Niinisto and Erdogan are scheduled to meet in Istanbul on Friday.

The Finnish president said he expects Erdogan to confirm Turkey’s backing, according to the Reuters news agency.

“We knew that when Turkish President Erdogan on his part has decided to ratify Finland’s NATO membership, he wants to meet and fulfil his promise president to president,” Niinisto said in an email to Reuters

Meanwhile, the Turkish president’s positive tone was also echoed by two Turkish officials who spoke to Reuters on the condition of anonymity.

“It is highly likely that the necessary step for Finland’s NATO membership will be completed before [parliament] closes and the election is held,” one of the officials said.

The Turkish parliamentary session is due to end in mid-April ahead of parliamentary and presidential elections scheduled on May 14.

“Positive messages will be given to Finland’s president during his visit,” the second official said.

The United States and other NATO countries are hoping the two Nordic nations will become members of the alliance at a NATO summit due to be held in July 11 in Lithuania’s capital, Vilnius.

Source: Aljazeera

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Recep Tayyip Erdogan has spent two decades in power, serving as Turkey’s prime minister from 2003 to 2014, when he was elected president. 

He now faces the enormous challenge of rebuilding swathes of the country that have crumbled to rubble in the most devastating earthquake since 1999.

He is also seeking re-election in May.

Who is Erdogan, how has Turkey changed under his rule and what do his critics and supporters say about him?

The early years

Born in February 1954, Erdogan grew up on Turkey’s Black Sea coast until he was 13, when his family moved to Istanbul.

He went to an Islamic school, and biographers say he sold bread rolls and lemonade to help pay for his schooling.

He later played semi-professional football and earned a degree in management from Istanbul’s Marmara University.

Erdogan was mayor of Istanbul from 1994 to 1998, losing his position when he was jailed for reading a controversial poem at a rally.

From prime minister to president

Erdogan became prime minister in 2003, two years after founding the Justice and Development Party (AKP).

He served three terms, presiding first over a period of economic growth fuelled by foreign trade and investment – before the tide started to turn against him.

In 2013, a wave of civil unrest broke out, centred on Istanbul’s Gezi Park. What started as demonstrations over plans to build a shopping mall over the park erupted into protests over a government seen to be becoming increasingly authoritarian.

In 2014, Erdogan became Turkey’s first directly elected president. Before this point, it had been a mostly ceremonial post; Erdogan sought to change that.

His vision of a new presidential system, which abolished the office of the prime minister and concentrated most powers in the hands of the president, was approved by a narrow victory in a 2017 referendum and installed following his successful 2018 presidential election.

An attempted coup

A group within Turkey’s military attempted to overthrow the government in 2016, conducting coordinated operations across several cities and targeting the president where he was holidaying in Marmaris.

Erdogan was flown to safety in a helicopter but about 250 people were killed and more than 2,000 injured after civilians stood up to the coup plotters.

In the crackdown following the coup about 150,000 civil servants were sacked and more than 50,000 people were detained, including journalists, academics, police officers, soldiers and lawyers.

Erdogan and the economy

Inflation in Turkey hit a 24-year high of 85% last October, with economists saying interest rate cuts sought by Erdogan were to blame.

Inflation dipped to just under 58% in January and is expected to sit around 40% when the country heads to the polls in May.

Turkey has been mired in economic crisis since 2018, with the lira plunging in value, slumping to one tenth of its value against the dollar over the last decade.

While high interest rates are normally seen as a way of bringing high inflation under control, Erdogan contends the opposite and vowed to keep cutting interest rates even as inflation hit its peak.

In January, Erdogan announced a raft of public spending, including doubling the minimum wage, lowering the retirement age and increasing pensions.

But his budget could be stretched now the government also faces the cost of a massive rebuild after the earthquakes.

Responding to the earthquakes

Erdogan has faced criticism from families left frustrated by a slow response from rescue teams.

Many Turks have complained of a lack of equipment, expertise and support to help those who are trapped.

During a visit to Hatay province, where more than 3,300 people have died and entire neighbourhoods have been destroyed, Erdogan said: “It is not possible to be prepared for such a disaster. We will not leave any of our citizens uncared for.”

Speaking to reporters, he criticised those spreading “lies and slander” about his government’s actions – and said it was a time for unity and solidarity.

“I cannot stomach people conducting negative campaigns for political interest,” he added.

However, he admitted there were some “shortcomings” in the initial response.

Erdogan and the world

Erdogan has long held close ties with Vladimir Putin and continues to call Russia’s president his “dear friend”.

Turkey’s president has offered to help mediate an end to the conflict in Ukraine and helped broker the deal for a safe export channel for grain in the Black Sea.

In recent months he has repeatedly threatened a ground invasion against Kurdish groups in northern Syria, sparking fears for control of prisons housing thousands of Islamic State fighters.

On the world stage, Erdogan has also been outspoken when it comes to Sweden and Finland joining NATO.

As a NATO member, Turkey has the right to veto any new inductees, and Erdogan has expressed concerns about the Kurdish population in Sweden.

What Erdogan’s critics say

Critics say Erdogan has turned Turkey into an autocracy – in other words, a one-man show – muzzled dissent and eroded people’s rights.

Reporters Without Borders lists Turkey at 149 out of 180 countries on its press freedom index, noting that 90% of its national media is now under government control.

Erdogan’s rolling back of the ban on women wearing headscarves was seen as one example of him reversing the secularity enshrined in the founding of the Turkish Republic a century ago. However, it was welcomed by Muslims who had felt excluded by the old rules.

Erdogan was also criticised for pulling out of an international accord designed to protect women from domestic violence in 2021. Hundreds gathered to protest the move, citing soaring rates of femicide in Turkey.

What Erdogan and his supporters say

Officials deny people’s rights have been curtailed, arguing Erdogan’s protected citizens in the face of unique security threats including the 2016 coup attempt.

Ozer Sencar, chairman of pollster MetroPoll, said that amplifying foreign policy and security issues ahead of elections allows Erdogan to consolidate his voter base – a reference to Erdogan’s remarks about Sweden and NATO.

He “creates a perception of a ‘strong leader’ inside Turkey,” he said. “If you can come up with a security problem, then people rally behind the strong leader.”

Meanwhile, the popularity of Erdogan and his party has hit a two-year high following a huge boost in spending, according to Middle East Eye.

A challenging election

The main challenge to Erdogan comes from an alliance of centre-left and right-wing parties, known as the Table of Six.

However, the parties are yet to nominate an opposition candidate.

Erdogan’s AK Party, now the biggest, is likely to remain a powerful force in parliament after the elections, but opinion polls show Erdogan trailing some potential presidential challengers including CHP leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu and the popular mayors of Istanbul and Ankara.

Source: Sky News

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With elections on the horizon, his future is on the line after 20 years in power and his pleas for national unity have gone unheeded.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan has admitted shortcomings in the response, but he appeared to blame fate on a visit to one disaster zone: “Such things have always happened. It’s part of destiny’s plan.”

Turkey lies on two fault lines and has earthquake building codes dating back more than 80 years. But last Monday’s double earthquake was far more intense than anything seen since 1939. The first quake registered magnitude 7.8 at 04:17, followed by another of 7.5 dozens of miles away.

Delayed search and rescue

It required a massive rescue operation spread across 10 of Turkey’s 81 provinces.

But it took time for the response to build and some villages could not be reached for days. More than 30,000 people from the professional and voluntary sector eventually arrived, along with teams from many other countries.

More than 6,000 buildings collapsed and workers from Turkey’s Afad disaster authority were themselves caught up in the earthquakes.

Those initial hours were critical but roads were damaged and search and rescue teams struggled to get through until day two or day three.

Turkey has more experience of earthquakes than almost any other country but the founder of the main volunteer rescue group believes this time, politics got in the way.

After the last major earthquake in August 1999, it was the armed forces who led the operation but the Erdogan government has sought to curb their power in Turkish society.

“All over the world, the most organised and logistically powerful organisations are the armed forces; they have enormous means in their hands,” said the head of Akut foundation, Nasuh Mahruki. “So you have to use this in a disaster.”

Instead, Turkey’s civil disaster authority now has the role, with a staff of 10-15,000, helped by non-government groups such as Akut, which has 3,000 volunteers.

The military’s potential was now far bigger than in 1999, Mr Mahruki said, but left out of the planning it had to wait for an order from the government: “This created a delay in the start of rescue and search operations.”

President Erdogan has accepted that search efforts were not as fast as the government wanted, despite Turkey having the “largest search and rescue team in the world right now”.

‘I warned them’

For years, Turks have been warned of the potential of a big earthquake but few expected it to be along the East Anatolian fault, which stretches across south-eastern Turkey, because most of the larger tremors have hit the fault in the north.

When a quake in January 2020 hit Elazig, north-east of Monday’s disaster zone, geological engineer Prof Naci Gorur of Istanbul Technical University realised the risk. He even predicted a later quake north of Adiyaman and the city of Kahramanmaras.

“I warned the local governments, governors, and the central government. I said: ‘Please take action to make your cities ready for an earthquake.’ As we cannot stop them, we have to diminish the damage created by them.”

One of Turkey’s foremost earthquake engineering specialists, Prof Mustafa Erdik, believes the dramatic loss of life was down to building codes not being followed, and he blames ignorance and ineptitude in the building industry.

“We allow for damage but not this type of damage – with floors being piled on top of each other like pancakes,” he told the BBC. “That should have been prevented and that creates the kind of casualties we have seen.”

Under Turkish regulations updated in 2018, high-quality concrete has to be reinforced with ribbed, steel bars. Vertical columns and horizontal beams have to be able to absorb the impact of tremors.

“There should be adhesion between the concrete and steel bars and there should also be adequate transfer reinforcement in the columns,” explained Prof Erdik.

Had all the regulations been followed, the columns would have survived intact and the damage would have been confined to the beams, he believes. Instead the columns gave way and the floors collapsed on top of each other, causing heavy casualties.

Quake tax mystery

Much has been made of failures in enforcing Turkey’s beefed up building code and the justice minister has said anyone found to have been negligent or at fault will be brought to justice.

But government critics such as opposition CHP party leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu argue after 20 years in power President Erdogan’s government has not “prepared the country for the earthquakes”.

One big question is what happened to the large sums collected through two “earthquake solidarity taxes” created after the 1999 quake. The funds were meant to make buildings resistant to earthquakes.

One of the taxes, paid to this day by mobile phone operators and radio and TV, has brought some 88bn lira (£3.8bn; $4.6bn) into state coffers. It was even hiked to 10% two years ago. But the government has never fully explained where the money has been spent.

Urban planners have complained that rules have not been observed in earthquake zones and highlight a 2018 government amnesty that meant violations of the code could be swept away with a fine, and left some six million buildings unchanged.

The fines brought in billions of Turkish lira in taxes and fees. But when a residential building in Istanbul collapsed in 2019, killing 21 people, the head of the chamber of civil engineers said the amnesty would turn Turkish cities into graveyards.

More than 100,000 applications were made for an amnesty in the 10 cities currently affected, according to Pelin Pinar Giritlioglu of Istanbul University, who says there was a high intensity of illegal construction in the area.

“The amnesty played an important role in the collapse of the buildings in the latest earthquake,” she told the BBC.

“We cannot go anywhere by blaming each other and we should seek solutions,” says Prof Erdik, who believes the problem goes beyond politics and lies in a system that allows engineers to go straight into practice after university with little experience.

Prof Gorur calls for the creation of “earthquake-resistant urban settlements” but for that there will have to be a shift in thinking, nowhere more so than in Turkey’s most populous city.

“We have been warning about a possible Istanbul earthquake for 23 years. So the policymakers of Istanbul should come together and make policies to make people, the infrastructure, the buildings and the neighbourhoods resistant to an earthquake.”

Polarised politics

President Erdogan has called for unity and solidarity, denouncing critics of the disaster response as dishonourable.

“I cannot stomach people conducting negative campaigns for political interest,” he told reporters in Hatay, near the earthquake’s epicentre.

Many of the towns and cities in the affected areas are run by his ruling party, the AKP.

But after 20 years in power, first as prime minister and then as an increasingly authoritarian, elected president, he leads a highly polarised country.

“We have come to this point because of his politics,” said Mr Kilicdaroglu.

Campaigning for elections expected in May has not yet begun but he leads one of six opposition parties poised to announce a unified candidate in a bid to bring down the president.

Mr Erdogan’s hopes of unifying the country ahead of those elections are likely to fall on deaf ears.

He has become increasingly intolerant of criticism and many of his opponents are in jail or have fled abroad. When an attempted coup against the president ended in bloodshed in 2016, he reacted by arresting tens of thousands of Turks and sacking civil servants.

The economy has been in freefall with a 57% inflation rate leading to a sky-high cost of living.

Among the government’s first actions in response to the earthquake was temporarily blocking Twitter, which was being used in Turkey to help rescuers locate survivors. The government said it was being used to spread disinformation and police detained a political scientist for posting criticism of the emergency response.

Turkish journalist Deniz Yucel, who spent a year in jail in pre-trial detention, wrote from exile in Germany that the aftermath of the 1999 Turkish earthquake helped propel Mr Erdogan to power.

This latest disaster would play a part in the next vote too, he said, but it was not yet clear how.

Source: British Broadcasting Corporation

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