Turkey’s statistics agency announced Monday that the Turkish economy grew 1.8% in 2020 despite the COVID-19 pandemic, beating all forecasts and estimates, including Ankara’s own. The positive growth rate, however, came at the expense of major fragilities that continue to haunt the economy, as evidenced by the fact that the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) has actually decreased in terms of dollars.

In a revised economic program announced in September, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government had projected the economy would grow 0.3% in 2020, while others, including international bodies such as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the International Monetary Fund, had anticipated a contraction of up to 5%.

The 1.8% growth rate puts Turkey next to China as countries whose GDPs grew last year even as the global economy contracted an estimated 4% and that of the European Union 6.4% due to the pandemic. The Turkish economy had grown by about 1% in 2019.

Turkey’s achievement, however, is sort of a Pyrrhic victory, with hefty costs underlying the veneer of growth. As many observers note, the growth rate was achieved through a slew of enforced conditions and at the expense of augmented fragilities.