Insights into Turkish Domestic and International Politics during March 16th- - April 15th 2014
By John VanPool, EGF Turkey and Black Sea Regional Analyst

Key Points:

• The AKP emerges victorious in the country’s municipal elections, capturing nearly 43 percent of all votes.
• Opposition parties fare better than in previous contests, but their split gives the AKP the upper hand at the ballot box.
• His party’s success means that Prime Minister Tayip Erdogan will likely run for the presidency in August’s first ever election by popular vote.
• Erdogan’s government blocks social media sites, referring to critics as “enemies” and further degrading political discourse in the Republic.
• Recordings of high-level military and political meetings continue to leak to the public, and are used by the AKP as justification to push for bans of many social media platforms.
• The presence of hundreds of thousands of mainly Sunni Syrian refugees in southern Turkey continues to concern Turkey’s Alevi communities.
• The situation in Syria remains static, but a large-scale military escalation has the potential to severely destabilize Turkey’s southern provinces.

• April 18, 2014

The United States, Russia, Ukraine and European Union together called on Thursday for an immediate halt to violence in Ukraine, where Western powers believe Russia is fomenting a pro-Russian separatist movement.

• April 17, 2014

President Vladimir Putin on Thursday said Russia had been forced to respond to NATO enlargement and that its annexation of Crimea, home to its Black Sea Fleet, was partly influenced by the Western military alliance's expansion into eastern Europe.

• April 17, 2014

Syria has submitted a "more specific" list of its chemical weapons to the global regulator overseeing the destruction of its stockpile after discrepancies were reported by inspectors on the ground, officials said.

• April 17, 2014

Unprecedented talks across the European Union on Tuesday showed it scrambling for solutions on the ground to break its dependence on Russian gas and help supply Ukraine.

• April 16, 2014

Russia is looking at the possibility of filing a lawsuit against the United States in the World Trade Organisation over sanctions hitting Russian banks, Economy Minister Alexei Ulyukayev said on Wednesday, according to Russian news agencies.

• April 16, 2014

A drop in March euro zone inflation to its lowest level since November 2009 was confirmed on Wednesday, keeping pressure on the European Central Bank to intervene if prices do not rebound.

• April 16, 2014

Russia and China aim to wrap up a 10-year series of talks about Russian gas supplies before President Vladimir Putin visits China in May, media quoted the deputy prime minister as saying on Monday.

• April 14, 2014