Geography Archives: Turkey

Thank you.  Thank you for the invitation, and, as we don’t have much time, let me go straight to some of the main points supporting this motion “Europe is failing its Muslims.”   Let me start by saying that we are living in a difficult situation.  If you listen to what is said in the European […]

We have argued that the Obama Administration’s approach to Iran sanctions is, truly, a “dead end” policy and that the only way out of this dead end “is to get serious about nuclear diplomacy with Iran — first of all, by reaching agreement on a plan to refuel the Tehran Research Reactor (TRR).”  Although the […]

The United States and China seem to have reached an agreement with regard to the exchange rate between their two currencies.  The agreement is that the U.S. government will stop yelling about it, and China will do whatever it wants to do, which will probably include some modest rise in the renminbi some time in […]

Obama Administration officials have been touting for some time that they have Russia “on board” for a new United Nations Security Council resolution imposing sanctions against Iran over the nuclear issue.  We, of course, have been arguing for months that, while Russia would probably end up supporting a new sanctions resolution, Moscow would not support […]

  Turkey has its own vision on the issues of international security.  On Iran, the Middle East, and nuclear proliferation, it has made itself the voice of the Muslim opinion which sees Israel as the chief troublemaker.  A member of the NATO and candidate for the European Union, led since 2002 by the “moderate Islamists” […]

  EXCERPT: Introduction This document was created by the community of Isha L’Isha—Haifa Feminist Center.  It began as a process of examination and re-conceptualization of the term “security” as we, feminist women in Israel, experience it.  Over the past five years, Isha L’Isha has been discussing and dealing with issues related to women, peace and […]

Author’s note: This is a response to Claudia Rosett’s “Turkey Tilts toward Iran,” published on 26 March 2010 by Forbes.com. Forbes columnist Claudia Rosett — who just so happens to be “a journalist-in-residence” with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a neo-conservative think tank — feigns her regret for having to report a “disturbing talk” […]

The Fifth Five-Year Plan of the Islamic Republic of Iran (1389-93, 2010-14), still under review by the parliament, has a clear goal for reducing inequality in five years — a Gini index of 0.35 for income.  This is a substantial reduction from the high level of inequality that has plagued Iran in recent years.  The […]

April 3, 2010 Istanbul, Turkey — Following months of preparation, a coalition bringing together a number of organizations and movements working to break Israel’s illegal blockade on Gaza was announced yesterday in Istanbul.  The coalition, composed of the Turkey-based IHH (Insani Yardim Vakfi) organization, the European Campaign to End the Siege on Gaza (ECESG), the […]

See, also, “Police Violence Marks Tekel Workers’ Protest in Turkey” (Hürriyet Daily News, 1 April 2010); “26 Mayıs’ta AKP’ye genel grevi gösterelim” (Sendika.org, 1 April 2010); “Planned Tekel Protest Barred by Police” (Today’s Zaman, 2 April 2010); “More Pepper Gas for Turkey’s Tekel Workers on Second day” (Hürriyet Daily News, 2 April 2010); Tolga Korkut, […]

Estimates of Iran’s subsidies vary widely.  The figure that I see most often quoted is $100 billion per year, which is a huge sum considering the fact that Iran’s GDP is less than $400 billion.  I have used a figure of $50 billion in a previous post, which maybe an underestimate.  My back-of-the-envelope calculations below […]

  “What is it that they have against Iran?  If you look at it, it’s only that Iran is rising as a competitor of Israel.  There is no other basis for this animosity.” — Aijaz Ahmad Aijaz Ahmad: The US is running out of all options.  You mentioned this possible agreement.  Iran has actually agreed […]

  Jayati Ghosh: What’s happening to Greece is in an interesting way what many developing countries have gone through.  It’s really an inability to have independent monetary and fiscal policies, combined with a fact that during the boom it was chosen as a favorite destination, which creates a situation where you then become uncompetitive.  Suddenly […]

The all too predictable dynamics surrounding a potential new Iran sanctions resolution in the United Nations Security Council continue to play out just as we have anticipated.  As some commentators are leaping on media stories that one of China’s diplomats took part in a P-5+1 conference call yesterday about a possible resolution, the Wall Street […]

Most of the Western media failed to report on Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s annual, live Nowruz (Persian New Year) address yesterday in his hometown of Mashhad.  Instead they took conventional snippets from his earlier pre-recorded message for state television.  In doing so, the Western media have again missed important content and context regarding Khamenei’s […]

Is Europe Planning Seal of Approval for Israeli Settlers? An exclusive club of the world’s most developed countries is poised to admit Israel as a member even though, a confidential internal document indicates, doing so will amount to endorsing Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian and Syrian territories. Israel has been told that its accession to […]

We were in Tehran on February 24 — the day when Iranian authorities announced the capture of Abdol Malik Rigi, the head of Jundallah.  Jundallah (the name in Arabic for “soldiers of God”; the group is also known as the People’s Resistance Movement of Iran) is a Sunni Islamist group that claims to be fighting […]

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton traveled to Brasilia to mount a full court press on the Brazilian government to support a United Nations Security Council resolution imposing tougher sanctions against Iran over its nuclear activities.  (Brazil is presently one of the Council’s ten non-permanent members.)  And, as accumulating media reports indicate, she was politely but […]

United States AfPak special representative Richard Holbrooke enjoys a fabulous reputation, no matter the current prospects of the Afghan war.  The Eurasian space knew him as a potential Nobel winner who evicted Russia from the Balkans.  The world at large expects him to take over if and when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton steps down […]

Last week, just after we had completed our regional tour to Beirut, Damascus, and Tehran, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made his own journey to Damascus, for highly publicized meetings with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, HAMAS Political Bureau chief Khalid Mishal, and a “resistance” summit with Assad and Hizballah Secretary General Shaykh Hassan Nasrallah.  Ahmadinejad’s trip […]