Hasan Cemal writes in t24 that Erdoğan’s agenda is more or less the same as the agenda of the regime of military tutelage in the past. Turkey has so far not been able to face up to its military problem. To this day, no one has been held accountable for the 1960, 1971, 1980 and 1997 military coups, nor for the string of assassinations during these decades. And regarding the military itself, it has neither questioned its own tradition of coups nor engaged in any kind of self-criticism.  Now, this coup tradition is being covered up by the court decisions to dismiss the Ergenekon and Sledgehammer cases. And it is Erdoğan who is doing the covering. But the problem is not disappearing. The military problem remains unsolved, and it cannot be brushed under the carpet. If we want to clear the way for democracy and the rule of law in Turkey, then we need to face up to the military problem and solve it, just as much as there is need to fight against Erdoğan.

By Gareth H. Jenkins

April 20, 2016

Although the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the Democratic Union Party (PYD) are ideologically affiliated, they remain organizationally distinct. Even though it does not pose a direct security threat to Turkey, the PYD’s increasing consolidation of power in northern Syria arguably poses a challenge not only to Ankara but also to the PKK.

By Halil Gürhanlı

April 7, 2016

With the refugee deal with EU, the regime in Turkey earns the silence of its European critics as the country proceeds towards complete authoritarianism. The EU leaders get to have their cake and eat it too, outsourcing gate-keeping while maintaining the moral upper-hand.  However, this is a joint “achievement” gained at the expense of millions of Syrian refugees. It tarnishes EU’s status as a normative power. Meanwhile, Turkey is also a loser, as it will not be politically and financially compensated for carrying the refugee burden.

Etyen Mahçupyan in Karar writes that it is obvious that ISIS has an understanding of Islam that leads it to see Turkey as an enemy, and that it intends to incite such an Islamic understanding inside Turkey. But at the same time, it is also clear that ISIS does not want to wholly be at odds with Turkey. Ultimately, it wants to be accepted as a force to bargain with in Syria and Iraq. Thus, even though they don’t hinder uncontrolled acts and though they may even resort to using violence as part of a strategy of “warning,” they have to get along with Turkey, insofar as they want to be a permanent force to reckon with in the region. The PKK’s position is no different. It’s easy to declare cantons (in Syria) when a war is raging, but much more difficult to sustain these when peace arrives…  It’s obvious that you cannot categorically trust the U.S., Russia or Germany. In other words, when we pass on to the next stage in Syria, Turkey’s view of an eventual Kurdish entity is going to be a crucial factor… And what is at least as critical as this factor is the fact that the PKK runs the risk of alienating its sociological base in Turkey if it escalates the violence. In short, the two terror groups that Turkey is facing are in fact in need of Turkey’s “acceptance…” We can predict that both organizations are going to want to resort to violence in order to bring Turkey to the point that they desire, but that they at the end of the day are going to want to keep Turkey by their sides. As a new table is being set in Syria, the number of groups that would like to have violence in Turkey is thus decreasing, not increasing.

Nuray Mert in Cumhuriyet writes that the opposition circles dangerously put their faith in chaos to get rid of the government. It is dangerous to hope that chaos is going to weaken the regime, instead of engaging in a serious struggle for democracy. Not only is an international isolation of Turkey not the solution that the opposition circles think; it will also provoke more extreme reactions from the regime. Which country has so far fared good after its leader was declared a “dictator?” We see what end that has befallen these countries. In such situations, the whole country crumbles together with the regime.  None of the paths of the opposition offers any hope for the future: not the extreme nationalism of MHP, with its hostility to the Kurds; not the Kurdish movement, which is only provoking the regime to be more repressive and Turkish nationalist; not the democrats and liberals who simply put faith in anything that they think is going to weaken the regime.