... Israel. While Saudi Arabia has remained at loggerheads with Israel, recently both are part of the Anti-Iran alliance. Israel, Turkey and Saudi Arabia along with its GCC partners countries demanded at the Munich Security Conference, that Tehran is punished ... ... Adel al-Jubeir further accused Iran in front of delegates at the conference. "It's determined to upend the order in the Middle East ... (and) until and unless Iran changes its behaviour it would be very difficult to deal with a country like this....
... long been buyers of the U.S. and Chinese military aircraft, expressed its interests in purchasing Sukhoi fighter and bomber jets. This can potentially expand Russia’s share of the arms market and increase the revenue.
Volkan Özdemir:
Russia and Turkey: More Than a Rapprochement?
Russia has set up its first and only permanent military base in the Middle East which now guarantees its military presence in the region. Hmeymim base is located in the eastern Mediterranean cost of Syria near the city of Latakia. While the U.S., UK, France and Turkey already do have their military bases in the region ...
Longstanding relations between Moscow and the Kurds has provided Russia with a “Kurdish card”, that is, the ability to modulate its support to various Kurdish national ambitions throughout the Middle East, depending on what the Kremlin was seeking to obtain from Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. The current Syrian crisis is no exception and has promoted the Russian-Kurdish (PYD[1]) partnership, especially during the period of harsh tensions between Russia and Turkey. This partnership has three goals: fighting terrorism,...
... own regional centers of gravity – like Egypt or Saudi Arabia. As for external factors affecting the Arab world, the influence of overseas’ players is likely to get less significant, while the influence of neighboring non-Arab states (Iran, Turkey, Israel) is likely to grow further. The role of Iran will definitely be one of the decisive factors shaping the future of the Middle East. Speaking of the Russian-Iranian relations, we have to define what their ‘strategic cooperation’ really means under the current circumstances. There has always been a temptation – at least on the Russian side – to build ...
On March 3, 2016 Moscow hosted a roundtable “
Collective Security System in the Middle East: Myth or Reality
” of the Russian International Affairs Council and the Turkish International Institute for ... ... was attended by RIAC Program Director
Ivan Timofeev
; MIRNaS Director General
Arif Asalyoglu
; former Foreign Minister of Turkey Yasar Yakis;
Vitaly Naumkin
, Director of the RAS Institute for Oriental Studies, and
Pyotr Stegny
, Ambassador Extraordinary ...
... the most fundamental problems pushing the two states apart from each other.
Over years serious disagreements over Caucasus, Middle East, Iran, Ukraine, NATO, BMD, gas pipelines and other matters were swept under the rug. But this mutual hypocrisy could ... ... forever. In a way, the ongoing crisis became possible only because the notion of a strategic partnership between Russia and Turkey had remained only on paper. Lacking the proper strategic depth, it did not pass a reality check and collapsed as a house ...
... suspend flights of its fighter jets over Syria. This was Moscow’s way to introduce a no-fly zone that the United States and Turkey have mulled for several months.
EPA / MIKHAIL KLIMENTYEV / RIA NOVOSTI
Ilshat Saetov:
From Downed Plane to the Greater Middle East:
Theories of What Happened in Turkey
The good news is that Russia decided to deploy S-400 at its base in Latakia and not to deliver the systems to Bashar Al Assad. But the reason why the US, Turkey, Israel and the GCC would be worried about this move is crystal clear: they fear that ...
... communities you do not like.” It is well known that Eregenekon, the Turkish equivalent of the Italian Operation Gladio and similar organizations, was created by NATO to counteract the USSR. After the USSR collapsed, they switched to fighting Islamism in Turkey and were even plotting to topple Erdogan. Perhaps now, after the truce, NATO is using the group inside the country for other purposes.
The U.S. Greater Middle East project, for example, assigns a big role to Kurdistan in various forms. If tensions arise in the region (a downed plane is a clear signal of that), then NATO troops can go in and create a Kurdish corridor along the Turkey–Syria border,...
... Jordan and other countries.
Opened by Dimitrios
Triantaphyllou, Director of the Center for International and European Studies, the event was composed of two parts, the first presenting a series of plenary sessions on issues from Ukraine crisis to the Middle East settlement other problems like corruption in Iran and socially responsible business in Turkey.
The speakers' list included Sergey Konoplyov, Director of
Harvard's Black Sea Regional Security Program; Adam Balcer, Program Director "The EU and the New Global Contract" at DemosEUROPA - Centre for European Strategy, Warsaw University; ...
In light of the recent developments in Syria and the apparently imminent US military intervention, the blog will take a short break from its relatively academic style and its thematic focus in order to brainstorm and share some thoughts on the broader picture of what is happening in the geopolitical arena of the region. Dangerous Double Standards Bashar al-Assad has reportedly used chemical weapons to attack, essentially, his own people. The first, logically obvious question is why would Assad essentially...
