The way a year ends usually determines how the next one starts, so Turkey's youth may be the best guide to the opportunities and challenges facing the country's political leadership as it enters 2013.
On Dec.18, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan attended a ceremony on the campus of the Middle East Technical University just outside Ankara to celebrate the launch of Turkey's first domestic high-resolution Earth observation satellite, Gokturk-2. The event's organizers didn't invite the president and opposition party leaders to mark this proud day for the nation, and they also excluded students. Instead, 3500 policemen were deployed to protect Erdogan from students.
