As Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan began making the rounds in the U.S. capital Wednesday, dozens of foreign policy thinkers, including former ambassadors to Turkey, released a letter warning that the situation in the country is “deeply troubling,” Politico reports:
Erdogan, who has served as prime minister or president of Turkey since 2003, has become increasingly autocratic, disappointing U.S. leaders who’d hoped Turkey could prove a model of Muslim democracy. An Atlantic article about Obama’s foreign policy said the U.S. president considers Erdogan “a failure and an authoritarian.”…The letter, released by the Bipartisan Policy Center, tackles Erdogan’s perceived excesses head on.
Turkey’s foreign minister has summoned Germany’s ambassador over a broadcast by German television station NDR, which satirized Erdogan’s authoritarian tendencies (above).
