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Turkey

Turkey

November 4, 2026

Ankara 6:16 pm

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Turkey probes Google’s AI search tools, orders protections for news websites

Turkey’s competition watchdog said it is assessing whether AI-generated answers appearing on Google Search divert traffic from news sites and impose unfair content-use terms.

A protestor holds a flag bearing a portrait of jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) Abdullah Ocalan during a demonstration of Kurdish people from all around Europe to mark the 27th anniversary of his arrest and to demand his liberation, in Strasbourg, Eastern France, on Feb. 14, 2026.

Turkey moves PKK leader Ocalan to prison villa as peace process faces new test

The move is expected to give the PKK leader a more direct role in negotiations, but deep divisions over disarmament and Kurdish rights continue to threaten the process.

OSCE Secretary General Feridun Sinirlioglu is pictured during a joint press conference with the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Switzerland's Foreign Minister at Vienna International Airport on Feb. 6, 2026 in Schwechat, Lower Austria.

Explainer

Who is Feridun Sinirlioglu, Turkey’s candidate for UN chief?

The Turkish president's confidant enters the race for UN chief with decades of diplomatic experience marked by both praise and scrutiny.

Demonstrators hold a banner reading "Free Gaza, free world"

Analysis

Gaza progress, Syria pullback: What Turkey wants from Israel’s next government

Ankara sees room for limited improvement in ties if Israel’s next government eases Gaza’s humanitarian crisis and reduces military pressure on Syria.

Barin Kayaoglu

By Barin Kayaoglu

In Ankara, reporting on geopolitics and national security

Latest News

Explainer

After EU rebuff, how Turkey is courting Egypt for maritime deal

Turkish Navy sailors wave their caps from the flight deck

Culture

Rock collapse near UNESCO-listed site in Turkey’s Cappadocia kills three

An view of the Uchisar settlement, east of Nevesehir in the province of the same name in central Turkey's historical Cappadocia region on Aug. 24, 2022.

Tornado kills 4 in Turkey’s Mediterranean tourism hub Antalya

Kepez

Saudi Arabia’s KBS, top Turkish and Pakistani officials hold rare meeting in Iran: What to know

GEOFFROY VAN DER HASSELT/AFP via Getty Images

Samuel Wendel

Senior Analyst, Middle East Business & Tech

In Washington, DC, reporting on regional business and tech

Amberin Zaman

Chief Correspondent

Reporting on geopolitics, minorities, human rights, culture

Jack Dutton

Chief Business Correspondent

In Bristol, reporting on regional business, climate change, AI, tech

Ezgi Akin

Associate Editor (Turkey)

In Ankara, reporting on diplomacy, EU-Turkey ties, NATO

Francesco Schiavi

In Bologna, reporting on security, defense, economy, governance

Barin Kayaoglu

In Ankara, reporting on geopolitics and national security

Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al Faisal (L) talks with Qatar Foreign Minister Khalid Al Attiya following their meeting with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and members of the Arab Peace Initiative at the United States Embassy in Paris, September 8, 2013. REUTERS/Susan Walsh/Pool (FRANCE - Tags: POLITICS) - RTX13CWG

US-Russia Syria Deal Affects Saudi Regional Strategy

The US-Russia deal on Syria chemical weapons gives momentum to possible settlement and may mean changes for regional players.

Ferhat Savun aged 11, works on his homework in his home in town of Cizre in Sirnak province, near the border with Syria March 23, 2013. Turkey's fledgling peace process with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group is all over the headlines. After three decades of war, 40,000 deaths and a devastating impact on the local economy, everybody seems ready for peace. Pro-Kurdish politicians are focused on boosting minority rights and stronger local government for the Kurds, who make up about 20 percent o

PKK's Kurdish Education Demands Spark Debate in Turkey

Turkey continues to fear that education in languages other than Turkish will divide the nation, despite a growing demand for mother-tongue instruction and regional success stories.

Protesters gather in front of the office of the Agos newspaper during a demonstration in Istanbul January 19, 2009, to mark the second anniversary of the killing of Turkish Armenian editor Hrant Dink. REUTERS/Osman Orsal (TURKEY) - RTR23LJK

Family Boycotts Retrial for Murder Of Turkish-Armenian Journalist

The family of Hrant Dink issues an open letter of indignation after an appeals court decision that his case be reviewed, six years after the murder.

Mariam Aborkeek mixes plants with olive oil for her "Desert Daughter" soap in the Bedouin village of Tel Sheva, near the southern Israeli city of Beersheba, February 11, 2013. The cosmetics line, set up in 2005, is the brainchild of Aborkeek, a Bedouin. Brought up by the female members of her family, Aborkeek said she decided to share her Bedouin beauty secrets by transforming them into a variety of lotions and cosmetic products, using ingredients like desert melon, cumin, and bitter apple. Picture taken Fe

Israeli Job Market Closed To Arab Women Graduates

The Israeli economy loses an estimated NIS 30 billion annually because most Arabs are not being employed.

A woman hugs a tree in silence during a protest at Kugulu park in central Ankara June 18, 2013. Overnight in Ankara, riot police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse hundreds of protesters who had gathered in and around the government quarter of Kizilay. But in stark contrast to the recent fierce clashes in several cities, dozens of protesters merely stood in silence in Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir, inspired by a man who lit up social media by doing just that for eight hours in Istanbul's Taksim Square

Erdogan Tells Student Protesters To 'Go and Live in Forest'

Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan suggests university students protesting the construction of a road, which requires the cutting of 3,000 trees, should “go and live in a forest."

A demonstrator gestures as he stands behind burning barricades during a protest in the Tuzlucayir neighbourhood of Ankara September 9, 2013. Billed as a symbol of peace between two faiths, a new place of worship has turned Tuzlucayir, a poor suburb of Ankara, into a battleground and exposed wider sectarian tensions within Turkey. The project's blueprint envisages a Sunni mosque rising side by side with a new cemevi, or assembly house, to be used by Alevis, Turkey's biggest religious minority. But with its c

Is Turkey, After Gezi Protests, On Path to Democratization?

The democratization package to be proposed by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyep Erdogan may address some of the concerns of Turkish citizens.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry (R) walks with Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu (C) and French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius after a meeting regarding Syria, at the Quai d'Orsay in Paris September 16, 2013. The United States, Britain, France and Russia agree Syria must face consequences if it does not fully comply with a U.N. resolution to ensure a handover of its chemical weapons, Kerry said on Monday. REUTERS/Larry Downing (FRANCE - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST) - RTX13N9S

Davutoglu: Shooting Down of Helicopter 'Punishment' for Syria

Turkey’s frustration with the Damascus regime going unpunished, even for using chemical weapons, played a major role in shooting down a Syrian helicopter.

A tank and helicopters that belonged to the Syrian Army are seen at the Minnig military airport after it was seized by rebels, August 11, 2013. Syrian rebels captured the main military airport near the border with Turkey on August 6, consolidating their hold on a key supply route north of the city of Aleppo, opposition activists said. REUTERS/Mahmoud Hassano (SYRIA - Tags: CIVIL UNREST MILITARY TRANSPORT CONFLICT) - RTX12HMK

Turkey Should Shut Down Jihadists on Border

Turkey's shooting down of a Syrian helicopter that violated its airspace on Sept. 16 should provoke a clampdown on all border activity.

Members of Hamas security forces pray before a rally calling on Egyptian authorities to open the Rafah border crossing, at the crossing in the southern Gaza Strip September 17, 2013. Cairo closed the Rafah crossing, Gaza's main window to the world, completely last week after assailants crashed two explosive-laden cars into a security building adjacent to the border zone, killing six Egyptian soldiers. Ashraf al-Qidra, spokesman for the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, said 1,000 patients a month required med

Hamas Shuts Down Egypt Center in Gaza

The closing of the center reflects a further deterioration in Hamas-Egypt ties.

A Syrian refugee watches a television broadcast of Syria's President Bashar al-Assad speaking in Damascus, in their container at the Al-Zaatari refugee camp in the Jordanian city of Mafraq, near the border with Syria, January 6, 2013. Assad made his first public appearance in months on Sunday, calling for a "full national mobilisation" to fight against rebels he described as al Qaeda terrorists. REUTERS/Majed Jaber (JORDAN - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST) - RTR3C5EE

Sectarianism Dominates Mideast Media Coverage of Syria, Bahrain

A close look at Middle Eastern media reveals a sectarian bias for regional audiences and a more democratic face when broadcasting in English to the West.

A riot policeman uses a mobile phone to film protesters at Taksim Square in Istanbul June 22, 2013. Turkish riot police fired water cannon to clear thousands of protesters from Istanbul's Taksim Square on Saturday, the first such confrontation there in nearly a week. REUTERS/Marko Djurica (TURKEY - Tags: POLITICS CIVIL UNREST) - RTX10X89

Turkey’s AKP Mobilizes Twitter Army for Elections

The Justice and Development Party has acknowledged the need for a social-media strategy.

Turkish riot police are targeted with fireworks during a protest against a government project, the first ever cultural center containing an Alevi cemevi and a Sunni mosque side by side, in Tuzlucayir neighborhood of Ankara, on September 12, 2013 AFP PHOTO/ADEM ALTAN (Photo credit should read ADEM ALTAN/AFP/Getty Images)

Turkey’s Sunni-Alevi Fault Line

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s democratization package will need to dampen sectarian tensions.