Brian Grodsky, University of Maryland, Baltimore County
Vladimir Putin’s recent re-election was bad news for democracy in Russia. And it’s a major loss in the struggle for liberalism, as anti-democratic leaders are assuming power across the globe.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on March 1, 2014. Is he headed for another election victory?
Flickr
Turkey’s June 24 elections are the first in 16 years that could be politically meaningful. Opposition parties seem revitalised and could launch anti-Erdoğan coalition into the second round.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan seeks nothing short of leading the Muslim world, building on Turkey’s imperial Ottoman past.
Until the jihadist rebel groups are wiped out, there will be more civilian casualties, like this man and young boy in Eastern Ghouta.
Reuters/Bassam Khabieh
Despite a devastating toll in the seven-year conflict, which has seen 400,000 people killed and six million displaced, there is no end in sight for the people of Syria.
Kurdish protestors against the Turkish operation in Afrin outside the EU building in Lebanon on January 28.
Wael Hamzeh/EPA
Over the past three decades, Turkey has launched countless operations across the Iraqi and Syrian borders, succeeding only in making matters worse for itself. This time may be no different.
Turkish Airlines the first major international carrier to run a regular service to the Somali capital in more than two decades.
Reuters/Ismail Taxta
Turkey’s actions have arguably improved the situation in Somalia over the past six years but its increasing role could bring it on a collision course with other states.
Other regions may be helpful to Erdoğan for a short time, but they cannot substitute the economic and political contributions Turkey requires of Europe.
Here goes: Kurdish people in south-eastern Turkey vote in the constitutional referendum.
EPA/STR
This referendum is the first time in the democratic history of Turkey that an election has been seen as illegitimate by not only domestic contenders, but by international observers as well.
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been a central figure in linking the Gallipoli campaign with Islamic conceptualisations of the Turkish nation.
EPA
Associate Professor in Islamic Studies, Director of The Centre for Islamic Studies and Civilisation and Executive Member of Public and Contextual Theology, Charles Sturt University