Turkey’s delicate balancing act

The Turkish veto against the Swedish and Finnish NATO accession was only lifted last month. But President Erdogan has repeated his threats of blocking the bids.

Vladimir Putin works his Middle East connections. For his first international outing since the war in Ukraine, he went to Iran to meet with supreme leader Ali Khamenei and Turkish strongman Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Iran and Russia are seeking closer ties in the face of Western sanctions. Also on the agenda: negotiations over blockaded imports of Ukrainian grain and the situation in Syria.

Iraqi officials have blamed Turkey for an airstrike on the Kurdistan region that killed at least eight tourists. But Turkey distanced itself from the shelling, saying it was a "terror attack."

Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu slammed Finland and Sweden for allowing "terror propaganda" as the two countries await Ankara's permission to join NATO.

Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu slammed Finland and Sweden for allowing "terror propaganda" as the two countries await Ankara's permission to join NATO.

Greece and Turkey have been at loggerheads for decades over the eastern Aegean islands. During a visit to Athens, Germany's foreign minister said the "islands are Greek territory," drawing a strong rebuke from Turkey.

Envoys of the three countries were meeting for the first time since their key agreement in June. Ankara's opposition has continued to work as an obstacle for Finnish and Swedish NATO accession.

Turkish singer Gulsen was accused of inciting hatred over a joke she made about a band member who attended a religious school. She faces trial on October 21.

After ten years of fleeing and exile, disillusionment is spreading among Syrian families in Istanbul. Their hopes for an end of the Assad regime have disappeared.

The Turkish president said his government would quickly start working on plans for the project — despite facing criticism from fellow NATO members over his relations with Russia amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.

Rescuers worked on Saturday to free more than a dozen miners still thought to be trapped underground at a coal pit in northern Turkey, where a methane blast a day earlier killed at least 28 people. “Fifty eight of our miners were able to come out unharmed.

In Turkey, incidents of gun violence have increased by almost 75 percent since 2015, claiming the lives of more than 2,000 people last year alone. Campaigners are calling for a review of gun ownership laws, as the vast majority of weapons are sold illegally.