Breaking the Mold By Mehmet Enes Beşer Bangladesh in the past two decades has witnessed unparallel economic advance and comparative political stability under the leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. Through the success saga has been the robust economic and strategic relationship with India, Bangladesh’s largest and formerly most critical external actor neighbor. From cross-border linking and sharing of energy ...

On US-Israeli plans ahead. The map in Syria has changed. The PKK/SDF, backed by the US for decades, has been forced to pull out of key strategic positions it has been controlling in northern Syria following a military operation launched by the Damascus government. Control over oil fields, border areas, and fertile agricultural land has now shifted to Damascus. So ...

Evolution of the recent protests and future scenarios. The twelve-day Iran–Israel war ended in a ceasefire without bringing about any fundamental change in the regional order, and the previous fragile situation continued to persist. What became clear in this war was that Israel has the backing of the entire Western world, while Iran is not a state that can be ...

Beyond the Monroe Mindset. By Mehmet Enes Beşer In recent years, China’s increasing presence throughout Latin America and the Caribbean has alarmed U.S. policymakers and analysts. From Andean construction projects to online investments throughout the Caribbean, Beijing’s economic footprint is growing—and with it, anxiety in Washington that U.S. influence in its self-declared backyard is under siege. But framing China’s overtures ...

A major operation forced the SDF into the corner. Syria experienced days of intense fighting that ended on Tuesday with a preliminary agreement, which could determine the country’s administrative future. It all began in two neighborhoods of the city of Aleppo. After the evacuation of the civilian population and clashes, the armed groups belonging to the Syrian Democratic Forces had ...

Revelations of a secret document from the United States’ Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) By Yiğit Saner Yet another round of US-orchestrated negotiations on a peaceful settlement of the Russian-Ukrainian crisis has yielded no results, expectations of an imminent ceasefire continue to diminish. However, exclusive material obtained by our editorial team indicates that Kyiv is not only uninterested in a ...

From Outsider to Architect? By Mehmet Enes Beşer When China initially made overtures to rejoin the world trade system in 1986, it was as an economic unknown. Its role in international trade was slight, its industry nascent, and its institutions only beginning the transition from a closed command economy to one tentatively open to the forces of markets. The long ...

Main political events in Türkiye in the last week. Last week in Türkiye, developments in Syria topped the political agenda. Operations launched by the Syrian government against the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which Ankara designates as a terrorist organization, were met with a positive response in the Turkish capital. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan’s remarks on the US, emphasizing alliance relations, ...

Is the threat real? By Feyyaz Erkin Eşli In recent months, European capitals have once again been discussing a large-scale defense project called the “European Initiative for Drone Protection” or, as it is more commonly referred to, the “drone wall”. The initiative, proposed by the European Commission, envisions the creation of a multi-layered system for detecting and neutralizing UAVs along ...

Could Trump’s Tariffs Accelerate the Dollar’s Decline? By Mehmet Enes Beşer Donald Trump’s revival of aggressive tariff policy has once more shook global markets. His threat to block blanket duties on Chinese imports—and an upcoming 10% blanket tariff on all imports—represent not simply a reversion to protectionism, but a more profound disintegration of the multilateral trading regime the U.S. itself ...

Our story with America has reached its final chapter. By Ramin Madadlou, Assistant Professor, Imam Sadiq University, Tehran, Iran. Our story with America began with World War II. The Americans were one of the three occupying forces that entered Iran. Like the British, they spoke English, but unlike them, they did not have a bad record—indeed, they had no record ...

Only when acting alone can the EU establish a multipolar, rule-based, and inclusive international system. By Mehmet Enes Beşer For much of the past decade, the European Union has struggled to formulate a clear and independent policy toward China. Struggling between the gravitational force of its historic bond with the United States and the multidimensional realities of its economic dependence ...