Free Republic

Will Tehran Throw Assad to the Wolves? For Assad’s Removal, Iran May Hook up with Saudi Arabia and Turkey Iran is finally ready to dump its leading ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad. This falling-out eluded every effort of US diplomacy for decades. The rift burst out into the open when Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi‘s scheduled visits to Syria and Lebanon were abruptly cancelled without explanation. The events leading up to the rupture are outlined by Iranian sources: Intensive deliberations at Iran’s National Security Council and private consultations between Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the council chairman Ali...

IPT News June 9, 2010 SNIPPET: "The Turkish-based charity that helped drive last week's deadly confrontation with Israeli commandos has deep ties to Hamas and other terrorist groups. The Hamas ties are not in question. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and IHH officials simply do not acknowledge that Hamas is a terrorist group." SNIPPET: "U.S. officials have expressed concern over the fact that "IHH representatives have met with senior Hamas officials in Turkey, Syria, and Gaza over the past three years," but IHH is not a designated terrorist organization in the United States. It's fair to ask, why not?"...

Turkey and Russia signed 17 agreements on Wednesday to enhance cooperation in energy and other fields, including pacts to build Turkey’s first nuclear power plant and furthering plans for an oil pipeline from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. The pipeline would allow Russia to expand its oil exports from the Black Sea, bypassing the Bosporus, whose shipping lines are already at capacity. The deal follows several rounds of agreements between Russia and Turkey in recent years that have helped Russia maintain its dominance of Eurasian energy routes. On his first official visit to Turkey, the Russian president, Dmitri A....

Israel will impose a temporary freeze on the sale of advanced weapons systems to Turkey, once a key ally, because of blistering criticism of the Jewish state by Turkey's Islamist Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Jane's Defense Weekly reports. The latest outburst from Erdogan, who has been moving closer to Iran, came April 7 in Paris when he branded the Jewish state "the principal threat to regional peace" in the Middle East. Meantime, the Israeli air force, blocked from Turkish air space and bracing for possible long-range attacks on Iran's nuclear infrastructure, is scouting for new training skies in Europe...

More than 200,000 Turks protested against Turkey's prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan Saturday, demonstrating the intense opposition he could face from Turkey's secular establishment if he decides to run for president next month. According to the AP, protesters called on the government to quit and chanted slogans including, "We don't want an imam as president." Tens of thousands traveled from across the country overnight to attend the rally in downtown Ankara. Police cordoned off the meeting area - near the mausoleum of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey. Police on the scene estimated the crowd at more than...

Jordanian King Abdullah II held talks on Sunday with visiting Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the current situation in the Middle East, the Jordan's official news agency Petra reported. The two leaders vowed to exert efforts to revive the Middle East peace process and encourage the Palestinians and Israel to resume negotiations in accordance with international legitimacy resolutions, Petra said. The Palestinian issue was the core of the regional conflict, Abdullah said, noting that the Arab peace initiative, which was adopted with an Arab consensus, "was a relevant frame to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict on the basis of...

ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish police shot dead a suspected suicide bomber near Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's office in Ankara on Friday. Turkish television showed live footage of police shooting at the man, said to be around 35 years old, in a street in the leafy central district of the capital. A Reuters correspondent saw the man lying dead in a pool of blood. Witnesses said the suspected bomber had been unable to detonate his explosives. The incident revived memories of four devastating suicide bomb attacks in Turkey's largest city Istanbul in November 2003. More than 60 people were killed in...

Jan. 2, 2005 23:43 | Updated Jan. 3, 2005 16:53 FM's arrival signals upswing in ties By HERB KEINON Turkish Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul is scheduled to arrive Monday for a two-day visit here and in the Palestinian Authority, the highest-level Turkish official to arrive since the Islamic-based Justice and Development Party came to power in November 2002. Gul's visit follows a rough year in relations with Turkey, strained by a series of anti-Israeli comments Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan made in the spring and summer. One senior Israeli diplomatic official said Gul's visit is important precisely because of the...

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Turkey's most popular politician, the leader of an Islamic-oriented party, was barred Friday from running in November elections, the Anatolia news agency reported. The High Electoral Board ruled that Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the head of the Justice and Development Party, cannot run on Nov. 3 because he was convicted of reading a poem that the court said incited religious hatred. Turkish laws disqualify candidates with criminal records from running for office. Also barred from running were former pro-Islamic premier Necmettin Erbakan, the leader of the country's pro-Kurdish party, Murat Bozlak, and the most prominent Turkish human...

Turkey's supreme court has dealt a severe blow to the leader of the party tipped to win November's elections with a ruling which could stop him from standing. The Ankara court on Monday re-instated the criminal record of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, leader of the Justice and Development Party (AK). The ruling overturns a decision in a regional court last week which quashed his conviction for inciting religious hatred. Turkey's election rules bar people with criminal records from standing for parliament. The country's election board is expected to make a final ruling on Mr Erdogan's candidacy in the next weeks. Party...