Time for Realism: The Need to Refocus Turkish-Western Cooperation

German Marshall Fund of the United States, January 28, 2015

Emiliano Alessandri *

While failures in areas ranging from democratization to foreign policy have taken place in Turkey, over the same period the European Union nearly collapsed and the Middle East plunged into chaos. In this context, Turkey’s shortcomings are not greater, nor more worrisome, than those of its neighbors. For Turkey, the absolute priority is to decisively address the Kurdish issue. Because of the crisis of the Middle East state system, this long-standing question again threatens the Turkish state, despite the progress made internally. Though this is mainly a domestic undertaking, the EU and the United States could play an important supporting regional role.

* Emiliano Alessandri is a non-resident senior transatlantic fellow at The German Marshall Fund of the United States, based in Vienna, Austria.

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