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Abu Dhabi, UAE
CNN
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Turkey’s opposition on Monday introduced Kemal Kilicdaroglu because the presidential candidate to run towards two-decade ruler Recep Tayyip Erdogan in an upcoming election that might change the course of the nation.
Chief of Turkey’s secular and center-left Republican Individuals’s Social gathering (CHP), Kilicdaroglu (pronounced Ke-lich-dar-ou-loo) is extensively seen as every little thing Erdogan isn’t. He was lastly nominated after three days of political bickering among the many six-party alliance – simply three months earlier than the vote.
His much-awaited choice additionally got here after robust criticism of the opposition bloc for his or her delay in selecting their frontrunner, which analysts mentioned might have bolstered Erdogan’s possibilities.
Maybe crucial election in Turkey’s fashionable historical past, the vote is predicted to happen on Could 14.
It comes simply months after a lethal February 6 earthquake rocked the nation’s southeast, killing greater than 50,000 individuals in Turkey and Syria. It additionally falls amid hovering inflation and a forex disaster that final yr noticed practically 30% slashed off the lira’s worth towards the greenback.
Erdogan, who turned 69 final month, is hoping to increase his energy properly into a 3rd decade. And whereas the AK Social gathering chief is in the present day going through the fiercest opposition but to his rule, polls counsel a really tight race between him and the CHP candidate even after final month’s earthquake prompted widespread disgruntlement in his strongholds.
However who’s the marginally older, bespectacled contender hoping to interrupt Erdogan’s 20-year grip on energy?
A lawmaker representing the CHP since 2002 – the identical yr that noticed Erdogan’s AK Social gathering rise to energy – Kilicdaroglu, 74, climbed up the political ladder to develop into his get together’s seventh chairman in 2010.
Born within the jap, Kurdish-majority province of Tunceli, the get together chief ran in Turkey’s 2011 basic election however misplaced, coming second to Erdogan and his AK Social gathering.
Kilicdaroglu represents the get together shaped 100 years in the past by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founding father of recent Turkey and a die-hard secularist. He stands in stark distinction to Erdogan’s Islamist-rooted get together and its conservative base.
Regardless of his secular leanings, nevertheless, the opposition candidate and his alliance have vowed to signify all factions of Turkish society, which analysts say was demonstrated in his numerous coalition.
The opposition bloc’s roadmap has been clear in its purpose to reverse Erdogan’s presidential system, shifting in direction of a extra inclusive parliamentary system the place the president’s function holds much less energy.
“There’ll not be a centralization of energy by the hands of the president,” mentioned Mehmet Karli, coordinator of the Program on Modern Turkey on the European Research Centre at Oxford College.
“The presidency will develop into a symbolic workplace and Turkey will revert again to the parliamentary democracy that it was since 1921,” Karli, who can also be a long-term adviser to Kilicdaroglu, instructed CNN.
Kilicdaroglu stands for a extra “pluralist Turkish id,” mentioned Karli, the place freedoms and liberties are cherished.
Typically known as “Ghandhi Kemal” for each his bodily resemblance to India’s Mahatma Ghandhi in addition to his humble decorum, Kilicdaroglu is seen as Erdogan’s polar reverse, analysts say.
“Kemal Kilicdaroglu is every little thing President Recep Tayyip Erdogan isn’t,” Gonul Tol, founding director of the Center East Institute’s Turkey program in Washington, DC, instructed CNN’s Becky Anderson on Tuesday. “Erdogan is a rightwing, populist firebrand who has dismantled the nation’s establishments to ascertain his one-man rule.”
“He has little regard for experience or liberal democratic values,” she mentioned, including that whereas Kilicdaroglu isn’t as charismatic, “he desires to rebuild the nation’s establishments, diffuse energy and rule with consultations and compromise.”
Whereas each Kilicdaroglu and Erdogan hail from humble socio-economic backgrounds, “they developed to be utterly completely different creatures,” says Murat Somer, a political science professor at Koc College in Istanbul.
Symbolically, “Erdogan is the shopkeeper, Kilicdaroglu is the bureaucrat,” mentioned Somer, referring to Erdogan’s businessman-like method, versus that of Kilicdaroglu, who Somer says is extra dedicated to process.
“Kilicdaroglu will attempt to battle corruption and likewise carry previous corruptions to justice,” he mentioned.
Kilicdaroglu is predicted to have a softer and extra predictable method towards the West, analysts say, as he won’t be appearing unilaterally however by establishments.
“Kilicdaroglu is a robust believer that Turkey belongs within the West,” mentioned Karli, his adviser.
If the West desires a relationship with Turkey that’s based mostly on “shared values,” says Somer, then they’re very prone to expertise a a lot better partnership beneath Kilicdaroglu, whose values, he mentioned, are a lot nearer to these of the West and the European Union.
Conflicts with international powers are nonetheless certain to happen, he continued, as Turkey has its personal nationwide pursuits which Kilicdaroglu and the opposition are additionally eager to protect.
“However it is going to defend these pursuits with a distinct discourse and with a distinct method,” Somer mentioned, including that Kilicdaroglu’s international coverage is prone to depend on Western alliances.
Erdogan’s international coverage has typically been described as “combative” and “private,” which the opposition might change to develop into extra institutional, predictable and based mostly on comfortable energy, Somer mentioned.
Turkey’s friendship with Russia might also witness change, consultants say. A detailed good friend of Erdogan, Russian President Vladimir Putin has been clear to assist his Turkish counterpart.
Karli says that Kilicdaroglu will name out Russia for its violation of worldwide legislation, referring to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, whereas sustaining a balancing function between Moscow and Turkey’s Western allies.
Within the Center East, the place Erdogan has for months been pledging a brand new incursion into northern Syria amid his battle with Kurdish militants, Kilicdaroglu’s method is predicted to be a lot much less interventionist, consultants say.
Kilicdaroglu is a follower of Ataturk’s maxim, says Karli, that “until a nation’s life faces peril, battle is homicide.”
This yr’s election presents an unprecedented situation the place one candidate, Erdogan, is working towards a coalition of events that haven’t historically seen eye-to-eye on ideology, analysts say.
Somer, of Koc College, sees Kilicdaroglu’s method to working in a coalition as a possible power.
Kilicdaroglu and the 2 vice presidents he has named are the three hottest leaders within the nation, mentioned Tol. “In the event that they run as a workforce, this may definitely broaden the enchantment of the opposition coalition,” she mentioned.
The subsequent three months will outline Turkey’s future. And whereas many critics anticipated the earthquake to impression Erdogan’s reelection possibilities, polls point out that the federal government isn’t prone to lose as many votes because the opposition anticipated, Ozer Sencar, chairman of MetroPOLL, a Turkish polling agency, instructed CNN.
“After the earthquake, Erdogan’s reputation decreased by just one level, whereas Kilicdaroglu’s reputation decreased by 5 factors,” he mentioned.
“All these knowledge present that the losses of the federal government and Erdogan because of the earthquake are at a degree that may be compensated.”
The race goes to be a good one, mentioned Somer.
“Will probably be a referendum between democracy and autocracy, not an election between two candidates,” he mentioned. “Will probably be an epic story.”
Iraq enforces seven-year-old ban on alcohol sale
Iraq has begun imposing a 2016 ban on alcoholic drinks, Reuters reported, citing the nation’s official gazette – a transfer some Iraqis attribute to the rising clout of Islamic spiritual events that they concern is threatening social freedoms. Enforcement took impact seven years after the legislation’s passage by parliament.
- Background: Below the legislation, imported alcoholic drinks are prohibited and can’t be bought in native markets, or changed by domestically manufactured variations. Border crossings and airport authorities have been ordered to confiscate any alcoholic drinks within the possession of vacationers. Licenses to promote alcohol have solely been issued to non-Muslims in Iraq and, whereas ingesting in public isn’t prohibited, it’s frowned upon. Within the capital Baghdad, it isn’t uncommon to see youths ingesting on the banks of the Tigris River.
- Why it issues: Analysts say spiritual events exert extra affect within the present coalition authorities than current predecessors. Iraq is a conservative, primarily Muslim society the place most women and men eschew alcohol, however it isn’t an Islamic state, critics of the alcohol ban say. Nonetheless, Iraq’s stance on alcohol has lengthy been seen as comparatively liberal within the Islamic world in contrast with neighbors akin to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, the place possession of alcohol is outlawed.
No less than 6 Palestinians killed in Israeli raid focusing on killer of settler brothers
No less than six Palestinians have been killed in an Israeli army raid into the Jenin refugee camp within the occupied West Financial institution on Tuesday, the Palestinian Ministry of Well being mentioned. The goal of the raid was Abdul-Fattah Hussein Kharousha, the Israel Protection Forces mentioned, calling him a “Hamas terrorist operative” and saying he was suspected of capturing two settler brothers within the Palestinian city of Huwara final week. Hamas in a while Tuesday claimed Kharousha, 49, as a member, and mentioned he had killed two Israeli settlers in Huwara.
- Background: Brothers Hillel Yaniv, 21 and Yagel Yaniv, 19, have been shot as they drove by the Palestinian village of Huwara within the occupied West Financial institution on February 26. They lived within the close by Israeli settlement of Har Bracha. Their killing prompted settler mobs to rampage by the Palestinian city of Huwara final week, killing one Palestinian.
- Why it issues: The raid is no less than the third to happen in daylight this yr. The earlier two – one in Jenin and one in Nablus – every resulted in 11 Palestinian fatalities, together with militants being focused by Israel, individuals clashing with the Israeli forces, and bystanders.
Saudi international minister says Syria might return to Arab League
Saudi Overseas Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud mentioned on Tuesday that it’s “too early to inform” if Syrian President Bashar Assad could be invited to the Arab League summit in Riyadh, however that engagement with Damascus is important “and which will properly lead finally to Syria returning” to the grouping. “There’s consensus constructing within the Arab World that the established order isn’t working,” Al-Saud instructed journalists at a press briefing on the Saudi embassy in London on Tuesday.
- Background: Syria was largely remoted from the remainder of the Arab world following Assad’s lethal crackdown towards protests that erupted towards his rule in 2011. The Arab League suspended Syria’s membership in 2011 and plenty of Arab international locations pulled their envoys out of Damascus. Algeria hosted the primary Arab League summit since earlier than the Covid-19 pandemic in November, although Damascus stayed away after Algeria failed to influence different Arab states to finish Syria’s suspension.
- Why it issues: Assad has benefited from an outpouring of assist from Arab states following the devastating earthquake on Feb. 6, which killed 1000’s of Syrians. Saudi Arabia will host this yr’s Arab League summit.
In her sunlit portrait of the pole dancing teacher Nusaiba Al Maskari, the UK-born Omani photographer Eman Ali creates an arresting visible simile between the power of Al Maskari’s physique and the Hajar Mountains within the background. Gracefully extending herself horizontally from her pole, she aligns with the peaks above Muscat, a single fluid line throughout the image airplane.
Ali, who presently works between Oman and Bahrain, started training pole dancing herself whereas residing in London years in the past. She wished to satisfy and {photograph} Al Maskari specifically after listening to concerning the teacher’s personal studio, Rock & Rhythm, she defined over e-mail.
“I’m drawn to like-minded ladies who aren’t afraid to be themselves,” Ali mentioned.
Although pole dancing has develop into a preferred type of health all over the world over the previous twenty years, having such a studio within the Gulf nation is “extremely uncommon,” Ali defined.
“I love her bravery in bringing a sport that celebrates feminine sensuality to a extra conservative setting and am impressed by how she helps ladies really feel assured and empowered by their physique.”
The putting portrait is a part of Ali’s meditative sequence about life in Oman, “The Earth Would Die if the Solar Stopped Kissing Her,” a part of a world venture from the NFT platform Obscura wherein practically 140 photographers documented modern life throughout the identical month.
Ali’s contribution, which she additionally exhibited on the worldwide truthful Paris Picture final fall, is a love letter to Oman’s land and folks, “highlighting the sweetness, imperfections and power” that bind us, she defined.
Learn extra about Eman’s Ali’s work right here.
By Jacqui Palumbo
Correction: This text has been up to date to make clear that Erdogan and Kilicdaroglu ran normally elections in 2011, not presidential elections.
