Turkey's president is threatening to expand his country's buffer zone in Syria, primarily to resettle up to 1 million Syrian refugees, block Kurdish militants from entering Turkey and entrench Turkish influence in Syria.
To avoid Russian retaliation and showcase its independence from NATO, Ankara will resist calls to sanction Moscow over the Ukraine invasion.
Courting the UAE and Saudi Arabia may yield occasional deals. But without domestic policy changes, Turkey’s financial instability will persist.
Ankara’s policies are stimulating a recurring cycle of interest rate cuts, inflation and currency depreciation -- resulting in deepening economic instability.
The central bank’s new requirement that exporters convert some of their income to liras will not stop inflation, and may actually worsen it.
The Turkish president’s self-destructive behavior makes more sense when he’s viewed as an out-of-touch politician using a playbook for a world that no longer exists.
The president's short-sided, growth-focused strategy of cutting interest rates amid high inflation risks plunging his country into a full-blown financial crisis.
Amid rising inflation and a weakening lira, Erdogan’s push to reduce the CBRT’s main policy rate risks making both problems worse.
To survive the next election, Erdogan’s nationalist party is mulling controversial measures that could trigger more U.S. and EU sanctions.
Retaliating against YPG militants in northern Syria would put Ankara back on a confrontational path with Russia and Damascus.
