Turkey has invaded northern Iraq, the domain of the Kurdistan Workers Party, several times. Five years ago I was in the area where fighting is now taking place. At that time small Turkish groups used to cross the border to deliver strikes on Kurdish positions.
What has changed since then?
Kurdish separatists are now fighting in the Kurdish areas of Turkey bordering on Iraq. When the Turkish army retaliates, separatists escape into Iraq, where they hide in the mountains, regrouping and rearming for new forays into Turkey. Iraqi Kurdistan is the natural hiding place for Kurdish separatists, and Turkey can do nothing about it.
However, they have killed Turkish soldiers this time, provoking a wave of public indignation in Turkey, and the authorities had to act more resolutely in order not to look like weaklings to their own people.
An explosion ripped through an unlicensed fireworks factory in an industrial section of Istanbul on Thursday, killing 20 people and injuring 117, officials said.
The city's governor, Muammer Guler, blamed fireworks manufactured illegally in the five-story building. He ruled out terrorism, and said an investigation was under way.
Mayor Kadir Topbas said a chain of explosions destroyed the top two floors of the building in the Davutpasa district.
The first blast, at about 9:30 a.m. (2:30 a.m. EST), sparked a fire that drew onlookers, he said. Minutes later, there was a second explosion.
At least 20 people were killed — including eight onlookers — and 117 injured, eight seriously, he said.
"White smoke was rising into the sky from the factory as we came to the front of the building. People were running around. I helped carry out six injured people," a witness who identified himself as Ali told CNN-Turk television.
The force of the blast destroyed the top two floors and columns of nearby buildings, sending debris showering down on cars parked on the street below.
Turkey's Nobel Prize-winning novelist Orhan Pamuk might sleep a little easier tonight — or not. A series of dramatic arrests over the weekend has laid bare what is alleged to be a shadowy network of ultra-nationalist killers with connections in high places. Their hit list allegedly included the famous writer, targeted for speaking out about Turkey's patchy treatment of its minorities.
The allegations, widely reported by Turkish newspapers, are certainly as dark as anything Pamuk ever wrote. Istanbul prosecutors have arrested 13 people, including a former general and a high-profile lawyer, on charges of "provoking armed rebellion against the government." They are suspected of involvement in last year's string of nationalist-motivated murders, which cost the lives of prominent ethnic Armenian journalist Hrant Dink and three Christian missionaries, according to newspapers.
A small square of coloured material returns to the centre of Turkey's political stage this week as the government prepares to end the controversial headscarf ban.
The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which has its roots in political Islam, has been under intense pressure from its conservative supporters to abolish the ban since it first came to power in 2002. And now it has struck a deal with a right-wing nationalist party over the issue.
The two parties meet in the capital Ankara today to fine-tune changes, and analysts expect the package to be put to a parliamentary vote this week. Together, they have enough votes to change the constitution.
In the past the move would have been vetoed by the President, but the man in the high office is now Abdullah Gul, the former AKP foreign minister, whose selection last year sparked snap elections and a simmering political crisis.
Turkey expects to move into the world's top 10 economies in 15 years as it steps up major reforms and becomes a more European country, Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said Saturday.
He said Turkey is preparing for European Union membership despite opposition led by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who has tried
to shift the goal of talks to a lesser partnership.
As a Muslim nation that is democratic, secular and multicultural, Turkey will add «huge strength» to the EU by expanding its cultures, ethnic groups and values and making the bloc «a truly global voice,» not just a «Christian club,» Babacan said.
«A Europe of one religion is a very dangerous approach,» he warned.
Babacan spoke to a small group of reporters and later to business and political leaders attending the World Economic Forum, stressing the country's transformation over the last five years and its determination to continue economic, political and social reforms.
«For those who ask what kind of country Turkey is going to be in the next 10 to 15 years _ it is going to be more and more of a European country,» he said.
A police officer and four al Qaeda militants were killed on Thursday in southeast Turkey in raids launched by police who believed the Islamists were planning major attacks, the local governor's office said.
Special forces police backed by armoured vehicles launched raids on houses used by the Islamic militant group in and around the city of Gaziantep, in a 12-hour operation in the early hours of Thursday.
Four police officers were injured, two of them seriously, in clashes which erupted and brought parts of the city to a standstill. Masked police sharpshooters surrounded the targeted houses.
The Gaziantep governor's office said 19 people were detained in the operation. Police seized 75 kg of ammonium nitrate, an explosive, along with rifles, pistols, ammunition and documents.
Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis has arrived in Turkey in the first official visit there by leader of Greece for almost five decades.
The landmark three-day visit is being seen by both sides as an important step towards improving relations.
The trip's symbolic importance is clear; the last official visit to Turkey by a Greek prime minister was made in 1959.
What is less clear is the amount of substance such a trip can have.
Despite its symbolism, there is little expectation in either Athens or Ankara that this visit will bring any speedy resolution to the many longstanding disputes between the two nations.
Mutual suspicion
Those include the status of the divided island of Cyprus, and territorial disputes in, and over, the Aegean which brought the two countries to the brink of war just over a decade ago.
After years of mutual suspicion, at times turning into outright hostility, relations between Greece and Turkey have improved immensely in the past decade.
Turkish warplanes have bombed Kurdish terorist positions in northern Iraq, the Turkish military has said.
The jets struck targets in the Zap-Sivi, Avasin-Basyan and Kakurk areas, it said.
There were no immediate reports of casualties or serious damage, in what was the fourth Turkish air raid in northern Iraq since 16 December.
The Turkish military said that Tuesday's air raid had targeted only confirmed PKK positions, describing the strikes as "intensive".
It said in a statement: "Our planes returned to their bases safely after successfully completing their duties." it gave no details on how many jets had been involved in the operation.
The military said that efforts had been made to avoid any civilian casualties.
Turkey's General Staff said a senior general, Ergin Saygun, visited Baghdad on Tuesday for security talks with Iraqi and U.S. military top brass, including the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, General David Petraeus.
Turkey launched its first cross-border raid on 16 December. Three air raids and an incursion by ground forces followed shortly afterwards.
The US backs Turkish operations against the PKK and has agreed to share intelligence with Ankara.
U.S. President George W. Bush on Tuesday said he wants Turkey to be admitted to the European Union "in the interests of peace," describing Ankara as a bridge between Europe and the Muslim world.
"Turkey sets a fantastic example for nations around the world to see where it's possible to have a democracy that co-exists with a great religion like Islam," Bush said at a White House meeting with Turkish President Abdullah Gul.
"I strongly believe that Europe will benefit when Turkey is a member of the European Union," Bush added. "It's in the interests of peace that Turkey be admitted into the EU."
In Gul's first visit to the White House as Turkish president, the two leaders also discussed energy issues and the Kurdistan Workers Party, which Bush called "a common enemy."
"It's an enemy to Turkey, it's an enemy to Iraq and it's an enemy to people who want to live in peace. The United States, along with Turkey, are confronting these folks and we will continue to confront them for the sake of peace," Bush said.
Five people including two children were killed and 68 people injured on Thursday when a bomb ripped through a bus carrying military personel in a southeastern Turkish city.
Diyarbakir is the biggest city of mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey and home to large numbers of troops who are battling PKK terorists both inside Turkey and in nearby northern Iraq. The blast will keep up pressure on Turkey to strike PKK positions in northern Iraq.
Turkish televisions showed vehicles engulfed in flames as ambulances and firefighters rushed to the scene. One man's face was covered with blood.
The injured included children who were leaving a nearby school at the time of the blast.
"The place where the explosion happened was full of people, there was a private school right in front of it," a police officer told.
Television stations said there were large military installations near the site.
Several explosions happened one after another, security sources said, and CNN Turk broadcaster said the area near the site had been cleared in case of further blasts.
Turkish security forces have been on alert over the New Year fearing possible attacks by the PKK and its supporters as warplanes target terorist camps hiding in northern Iraq.
Turkey is preparing to amend a controversial law on freedom of speech that has been criticized repeatedly by the European Union and could slow EU accession talks with Brussels.
The justice ministry will hand the draft amendment to article 301 of the penal code, which makes it an offence to "insult Turkishness", to the cabinet within 15 days, Justice Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin told reporters on Tuesday.
It was not clear when the cabinet would approve the amendment.
Article 301 has been used to prosecute Turkish writers and thinkers, notably for comments on the mass killings of Armenians in 1915 under the Ottoman Empire.
Two years ago the government tried Nobel literature laureate Orhan Pamuk under article 301 for his remarks on the events of 1915-16, but he was acquitted on a legal technicality.
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