TURKEY

European Commissioner Johannes Hahn, who oversees EU membership bids, spoke to Reuters about Turkey during EU Foreign Ministers Meeting. Stating that “Turkey's EU dream is over for now", Hahn said that a new model based on "trade and security ties" is being discussed.

PACE (Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe) voted for reopening political monitoring procedure for Turkey. Turkey had passed this procedure in 2004.

Israeli scholar Efrat Aviv's work titled “antisemitism and anti-Zionism in Turkey from Ottoman era to AKP”, which she was working on since 2012, is published as a book recently. Teaching at Middle Eastern Studies Department of Bar Ilan University, Aviv also presented the extensive survey that she conducted for the book published by Routledge Publishing to the readers and researchers. We talked to Aviv about antisemitism in Turkey.

Trying to build a bridge between Armenia and Turkey with his photography, Umut Vedat tells about his works appealing to the peoples of both countries and projects in Tbilisi.

The Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights Nils Muiznieks released a memorandum about Turkey after 6 years. Muiznieks stated that the state of emergency must be stopped.

The documentary titled “Bees without Borders”, which was shot in the villages along Turkish-Armenian border, tells the story of beekeeping activities on the both sides of the border. The difficulties that these people on different sides of the border experience are almost the same and they all dream about opening of the border. Coşkun Aral, Müge Aral and Batuhan Tunçer tells about the document.

The report titled “Challenges and Opportunities of Refugee Integration in Turkey” is issued.

Issue of migration preoccupies many people in Turkey as the political atmosphere gets increasingly tenser. In a time like this, we wanted to get together with Armenians of Turkey who migrated to Armenia, the closest and most distant neighbor, during the hard periods of recent history and report their first-hand accounts. These people, who told about their lives with a great sincerity, revealed human's power and hope of starting over.

European Parliament passed the resolution stipulating the suspension of EU membership talks with Turkey.

High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini stated that they agreed on the continuation of the membership talks with Turkey and said that death penalty should be an absolute red line for the EU.