In Britain, Turkey has been making the headlines a lot lately.<\/p>\n
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office\u2019s recent travel advice<\/a> warning Britons of the heightened security risk in Turkey has led to somewhat sensational coverage<\/a> by the tabloid press. I see no obvious signs of large scale cancellations but the story titled “Terror threat to millions of holidaymakers as Isis target Turkey,” has alarmed some travellers.<\/p>\n Much of the Turkey related coverage focuses on news of ISIS sympathisers travelling to Syria via Turkey. The latest story<\/a> of the three sisters from Bradford who are feared to have fled to Syria with their nine children has once again revived the discussion of degree of collaboration between the Turkish intelligence services and jihadis fighting in Syria. The Times had a disturbing headline<\/a> the day after Isis was driven out of Syrian town of Tal Abyad by Kurds and rebels near Turkish border. \u201cBeaten jihadists shave beards and go to Turkey\u201d it said.<\/p>\n But there is a broader question that has been asked both publicly and behind the scenes.\u00a0 I come across more and more people, some of them long-time enthusiastic supporters of Turkey and its government, wondering loudly \u201cwhere Turkey really stands\u201d.<\/p>\n There have been polite comments about Turkey\u2019s series of miscalculations concerning developments in Syria ever since the first uprising against Bashar al Assad in 2011. Before Kobane, there was also considerable understanding and sympathy for Turkey\u2019s national security concerns over its own Kurdish insurgency. In recent weeks, the tide has turned visibly against Turkey.<\/p>\n The Financial Times<\/a> columnist David Gardner sees the capture of Tel Abyad as a real advance against ISIS, but he finds NATO member Turkey\u2019s (or to be precise its President\u2019s) reaction \u201ca striking collapse of judgement\u201d, the latest in a series of mega-errors that have undermined him.<\/p>\n David Gardner is not the only one asking \u201cWhich side is President Erdogan on?\u201d<\/p>\n A retired western diplomat with close ties to Turkey has told me that there is now a growing tendency to question \u201cwhat an authoritarian and Islamist Turkey is doing in our midst and on which side the Turks want to be with regard to the violence-plagued Middle East\/ peaceful Europe divide?\u201d<\/p>\n After the June 7th<\/sup> election, following the failure of the ruling Justice and Development Party to retain its parliamentary majority, there was widespread expectation that Turkey\u2019s foreign policy may change course and the President would no longer determine policy single-handedly.\u00a0 President Erdogan\u2019s reaction to the Kurdish gains in northern Syria, together with strong statements<\/a> from Turkish government spokesman and Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc have already shown that this is not the case. Pro-government daily Yeni Safak editor Ibrahim Karagul\u2019s column<\/a> on Tuesday talked about \u201cthe plan to destroy Turkey\u201d, calling for a military intervention to stop the rise of Kurdish forces over the border.<\/p>\n With 23,000 more refugees fleeing into the country and no prospect of a stable government in sight, Turkey is indeed facing an uncertain future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In Britain, Turkey has been making the headlines a lot lately. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office\u2019s recent travel advice warning Britons of the heightened security risk in Turkey has led to somewhat sensational coverage by the tabloid press. I see no obvious signs of large scale cancellations but the story titled “Terror threat to millions […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[4],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27716"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27716"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27716\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27718,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27716\/revisions\/27718"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.firdevstalkturkey.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}