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How will Erdogan solve 'terror problem' that brought him victory?

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan may face some high-cost moves to put the terror and chaos genie back into the bottle after unleashing it to make up for his party’s June electoral failure.

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People wave flags and hold a portrait of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as they wait for the arrival of Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu in Ankara, Nov. 2, 2015. — REUTERS/Umit Bektas

The 49.4% of the vote the Justice and Development Party (AKP) got in the Nov. 1 elections beat all forecasts, astonishing not only Turkey and the world but the party’s own quarters as well. How the AKP was able to boost its vote by a fifth in only five months after losing its parliamentary majority with 40.8% in June is now an imperative question.

With an outcome of such an extraordinary nature, the AKP — a party supposed to have fatigued and lost some appeal after 13 years in power — must have resolved some major problem in Turkey in five months’ time or convinced part of the electorate that only the AKP could resolve that problem.

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