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Turkey

Turkey

November 11, 2026

Ankara 12:57 pm

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Explainer

Iran war pushes up coal use, complicating Turkey’s COP31 pledge

Turkey is asking world leaders at COP31 to back a global push to use more electricity, even as the Iran war has driven up natural gas prices and pushed some power producers back to coal.

OZAN KOSE/AFP via Getty Images

Turkey bars MP’s wife from travel after his fund scandal criticism: What to know

Opposition politicians and rights advocates described Yonca Verdioglu Sik’s brief detention as an attempt to intimidate her husband, opposition lawmaker Ahmet Sik, over his criticism of the government.

A steel worker works in front of giant iron melting pot in Kardemir Iron and Steel Factory in Karabuk, northwestern Turkey, Aug. 26 2005. (TARIK TINAZAY/AFP via Getty Images)

Steel factory explosion in western Turkey kills at least 16

Footage from the scene showed a huge plume of thick smoke spreading into the sky as flames engulfed a tall structure within the plant.

Latest News

Analysis

Will Democrats block Trump’s push to deliver Turkey F-35s, lift sanctions?

MEHMET ESER/Middle East Images/AFP via Getty Images

Barin Kayaoglu

By Barin Kayaoglu

In Ankara, reporting on geopolitics and national security

Costa Rica's Grynspan extends lead in UNSG poll as Nusseibeh places fourth

United Arab Emirates

Turkey’s parliament ratifies Mecca pact in boost to Saudi Arabia

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan addresses Turkish members of parliament during the opening of the parliamentary session at the Grand National Assembly of Turkey in Ankara, on Oct. 1, 2026.

Samuel Wendel

Senior Analyst, Middle East Business & Tech

In Washington, DC, reporting on regional business and tech

Amberin Zaman

Chief Correspondent

Reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

Jack Dutton

Chief Business Correspondent

In Bristol, reporting on regional business, climate change, AI, tech

Ezgi Akin

Associate Editor (Turkey)

In Ankara, reporting on diplomacy, EU-Turkey ties, NATO

Francesco Schiavi

In Bologna, reporting on security, defense, economy, governance

Barin Kayaoglu

In Ankara, reporting on geopolitics and national security

A Turkish soldier stands guard as Syrian Kurds cross the border fence into Turkey near the southeastern town of Suruc in Sanliurfa province, September 19, 2014. Several thousand Syrian Kurds began crossing into Turkey on Friday fleeing Islamic State fighters who advanced into their villages, prompting warnings of massacres from Kurdish leaders. Islamic State (IS) fighters have seized villages in northern Syria over the past two days and are besieging the mainly Kurdish town of Ayn al-Arab, known as Kobani i

Can Turkey set up buffer zone inside Syria?

The idea of a buffer zone on the Syrian side of the border has been revived again, but faces serious feasibility questions.

Turkey's Family Ministry shames singles in new ad

Turkey’s Family and Social Policies Ministry evokes comparisons to Islamist radicals after using the image of headless figures in a controversial campaign “to battle aloneness.”

Turkey's Economy Minister Nihat Zeybekci speaks during an interview with Reuters in Ankara August 11, 2014. Turkey's government will maintain its calls for lower interest rates following Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's victory in the country's first direct presidential election, the economy minister said on Monday. Zeybekci told Reuters in an interview that the central bank's core mandate for price stability should be expanded to include employment and growth, although he added this would not be a top prior

Turkey’s economic growth fizzles

Turkey’s economic growth slowed to 2.1% in the second quarter, well below expectations, forcing the government to review its year-end target of 4%.

Turkey's new President Tayyip Erdogan (2nd L) and outgoing President Abdullah Gul (R), attend a handover ceremony at the Presidential Palace of Cankaya in Ankara August 28, 2014. Erdogan was sworn in as Turkey's 12th president at a ceremony in parliament on Thursday, cementing his position as the country's most powerful modern leader, in what his opponents fear will herald an increasingly authoritarian rule. REUTERS/Umit Bektas (TURKEY - Tags: POLITICS) - RTR444TR

Erdogan's $350M presidential palace

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has filled his newly constructed palace in Ankara with symbolism of his overthrow of Turkey’s old regime.

Riot police block the main Istiklal street to prevent pro-Kurdish demonstrators from marching, in central Istanbul February 15, 2012. Supporters of the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) held a protest to mark the 13th anniversary of the capture of Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan. REUTERS/Murad Sezer (TURKEY - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST) - RTR2XWA8

Davutoglu sets ambitious target for Turkish democracy

Developments contradict claims by Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu that Turkey will become a global power in terms of universal democracy over the next nine years.

A woman reads a newspaper at a cafe, with an opposition newspaper carrying an upside down picture of Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan on the window, in the Aegean coastal town of Cesme, western Turkey July 14, 2014. As families splash in the sea and lounge in the sun, thoughts of politics and civic duty are a world away for most Turks holidaying on the Aegean and Mediterranean coasts. Only the most committed opponents of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan leave the beach to queue in a sweltering council bui

Banished Erdogan critics find new home at opposition paper

The Sozcu daily, a relative newcomer in the Turkish press, has climbed to the top of the circulation ladder, taking on board senior journalists dumped from other papers for criticizing the government.

Turkish villages smuggle IS oil through makeshift pipelines

In the village of Hacipasa, almost every house is connected to an illegal oil pipeline smuggling IS oil into Turkey.

A Turkish flag, with the Ottoman-era New mosque in the background, flies over a passenger ferry in Istanbul August 20, 2014. REUTERS/Murad Sezer (TURKEY - Tags: RELIGION TRAVEL) - RTR434PO

Moderate Muslims' quandary about IS

Both Turkey and other Muslim societies need more voices that will take extremism seriously and discredit it with serious arguments.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry (L) and Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu pose before a meeting in Ankara September 12, 2014. Kerry will meet Cavusoglu, as well as Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and President Tayyip Erdogan during his two-day visit to the capital Ankara, the Turkish Foreign Ministry said. REUTERS/Umit Bektas (TURKEY - Tags: POLITICS) - RTR45Z0L

Turkey rows against the tide

Ideological assumptions based on Islamist and Sunni sympathies, as well as a series of bad judgments, leave Turkey with diminished influence in a region where it once hoped to play a leadership role.

Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan (2nd L) poses for a family photo with European Parliament President Martin Schulz (L), European Union Council President Herman Van Rompuy (2nd R) and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso (R) ahead of a EU-Turkey summit at the EU council headquarters in Brussels January 21, 2014. REUTERS/Yves Herman (BELGIUM - Tags: POLITICS) - RTX17NZX

Turks turn to EU with renewed enthusiasm

Public support for EU membership in Turkey has shot up from 45% to 53% in just one year, a new survey says.

Workers shout slogans during a protest in front of an residential project, where an accident occurred in Istanbul September 8, 2014. Turkish real-estate developer Torunlar REIT said on Monday it has halted construction activities at all of its projects for five days following an accident that killed 10 workers at an Istanbul residential project. Work on the residential project, where the accident occurred at the weekend, has been suspended indefinitely and a legal investigation has been launched there, acco

Turkish workers face perilous conditions

Turkey's workplace is the most dangerous in Europe, and critics blame the Justice and Development Party's brand of crony capitalism.

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators march to protest Israeli military strikes on Gaza, during a rally in central Istanbul July 13, 2014. Thousands fled their homes in a Gaza town on Sunday after Israel warned them to leave ahead of threatened attacks on rocket-launching sites, on the sixth day of an offensive that Palestinian officials said has killed at least 160 people. Militants in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip kept up rockets salvoes deep into the Jewish state and the worst bout of Israel-Palestinian bloodshed i

Obama asks Erdogan to combat anti-Semitism

Anti-Semitism has reached alarming levels in Turkey, where public figures are calling out Jewish Turks over Israel's actions in Gaza.