April 5, 2014
The landslide success of Erdogan’s party, the AKP, and Vladimir Putin’s skyrocketing domestic popularity in the wake of the Crimean crisis are golden opportunities for a rethink of Western officialdom’s policies towards Turkey and Russia. Unlike my counterparts in Washington, I prefer to label the Turkish and Russian political systems as “alternative democracies”. Sure, on… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
July 6, 2013
It might seem odd to some of my regular readers that I have avoided tackling the latest developments in Egypt or Syria. Alas, geopolitics also deals with spheres of influence, and I am usually writing from an European perspective on my blog. Although during George W Bush’s war on terror State Department officials have devised… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
June 8, 2013
That the EU’s democracies are in crisis, courtesy of the global financial markets and the troika, is by now clear to all. These threats to democracy, however, are external. A more dangerous challenge to parliamentary democracy in countries like France and now Turkey comes from within the system itself. In these two countries, the opposition… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
May 2, 2013
At the periphery of the European Union, two candidates for membership are trying to hedge their geopolitical bets. Turkey, the largest of the two, is a long-standing NATO member but has also gained recently ” dialogue partner “status within SCO (Shanghai Co-operation Organization) , which includes China, Russia and four of the “five stans”. While… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
March 21, 2012
The implosion of the Soviet Union has in many ways adversely affected the stability of the Central Asian republics like Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan or Uzbekistan. Since 1991, a loose alliance of 11 former Soviet republics, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), was formed in order to preserve, at least in part, the Soviet-era heritage in… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
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, Central Asia, E.U., geoeconomics, Russia, Turkey |
September 30, 2011
Over the last two weeks, Turkish diplomacy went all out to capitalise on the country’s increasing international clout. President Abdullah Gul has made a 4-day visit to Germany, Turkey’s main European partner, whereas premier Erdogan has made a highly publicised visit to Egypt and has recently met with President Obama in New York to discuss… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
June 15, 2011
When it comes to geopolitics, few major shifts are more important than the emergence of an Islamic democracy in Turkey. Long resisted by the Turkish military and its western allies, the accession to power of Erdogan’s AKP party in 2002 has provoked major changes for the better in Turkey’s economic performance, institutional architecture and foreign… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
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, Islam, Middle East, Turkey |
April 28, 2011
The ongoing turmoil in the Arab world is sadly being shadowed by a relatively minor refugee crisis. There are a lot of misgivings voiced in the media and even in the blogosphere about the negative impact that Arab revolutions have on Europe. Unfortunately, such attitudes are being put to good use by the European buddies… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
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, Africa, E.U., Middle East, Turkey |
April 19, 2011
Assad family’s Syria has been credited by an Arab expert, wrongly I believe, with being the political model emulated by the likes of Hosni Mubarak, Saddam Hussein or Ali Saleh. The same expert calls the Arab countries led by presidents-for-life and by their offspring “monarchic republics”. Whilst the label is appropriate, the political model for… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
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, Middle East, Syria, Turkey, USA |
February 9, 2011
After almost one week of tribulations, the European Commission has officially announced that it will put together aid packages to help smooth Tunisia’s and Egypt’s transition to democracy. The United States and Israel are still claiming that sticking with the “devil you know” could prove a better option, in spite of evidence to the contrary… » read more
Posted by Florian Pantazi
