Fragments of a blog
Fragments of a blog
Russia can’t always be at war with Turkey: at some point, it will have to patch up the relationship. One would think that the Turkish intelligentsia and students should be natural allies for any force opposed to Erdogan’s neo-Islamism and…
The Financial Times ran this primer to ISIS’ oil business almost two months ago. Four out of the five smuggling routes taking ISIS crude from Syria into Turkey entered the Hatay province, crossing its eastern or south-eastern border. In October-November…
Predictably, Russian authorities are working hard to make life intolerable for Turkish citizens living in Russia: …there were reports of harassment and fear in the Turkish student community. In the city of Saratov, police arrived at a student dormitory on Saturday…
The more I read about the history of Hatay, Turkey’s appendage-like province disputed by Syria, the more I am convinced that its status remains a sore point for Ankara. Also, Turkey’s military is in solidarity with Erdogan on the need to…
The Russian speakers of Eastern Ukraine were not at risk of being killed by Ukrainian forces until Russia’s allies or puppets began the war in Donbass. The Turkomans of Syria have been at risk since the start of the civil…
The Russian government seems to be overreacting to the Su–24 crisis, threatening wide-scale economic sanctions against Turkey that are certain to hurt Russian consumers. (Bombing Voronezh in response, again.) Is this Putin taking personal offense – an ego contest between the…
This detailed map by the BBC tells the story. When I first saw a map of the area, at The Guardian, I could almost hear the pilot saying: “I’m not going to change course – it’s only five kilometers, man…