Turkey

17 Jan 2023; MEMO: Turkish Foreign Minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, announced last week that travellers with a visa would be required to be insured before-hand to discourage irregular migration, Anadolu Agency reports.

According to the report, the visa insuring requirement would help the government cover the cost of sending back people who arrive in Turkiye with permission, but somehow end up as irregular immigrants.

ANKARA, Jan 16 (Reuters) - Sweden and Finland must deport or extradite up to 130 "terrorists" to Turkey before the Turkish parliament will approve their bids to join NATO, President Tayyip Erdogan said.

The two Nordic states applied last year to join NATO following Russia's invasion of Ukraine but their bids must be approved by all 30 NATO member states. Turkey and Hungary have yet to endorse the applications.

14 Jan 2023; MEMO: The Turkish Parliament speaker, foreign minister and other senior Turkish officials slammed Sweden on Friday over allowing a PKK/YPG provocative show in Stockholm.

"We saw another provocation by the PKK/YPG terrorist group in Sweden. In fact, this is an act that includes both racism and a hate crime. Therefore, it is an act that Sweden must also fight against," Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu asserted.

ISTANBUL, January 14. /TASS/: Any peace plan for Ukraine should take into account Russia’s opinion, but Europe and the United States should also participate in finding this solution, Turkish Presidential Spokesman Ibrahim Kalin told foreign reporters, among whom was a TASS correspondent, on Saturday.

ANKARA, Jan 14 (Reuters) - Turkey is running out of time to ratify NATO membership bids by Sweden and Finland before it holds elections expected in May, a Turkish presidential spokesman said on Saturday.

President Tayyip Erdogan's spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said Turkish ratification of the countries' bids depended on how quickly Stockholm fulfils counter-terrorism promises made as part of a deal with Ankara, warning that could take months.

14 Jan 2023; MEMO: The General Secretariat of the Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad held its fourth meeting on Friday in Istanbul, Turkiye, under the title "Raise your flag".

ANKARA, Jan. 13 (Xinhua) -- Turkish prosecutors on Friday launched an investigation into a protest against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, semi-official Anadolu Agency reported.

The decision came after the Turkish president filed a criminal complaint with Turkish prosecutors over the protest.

12 Jan 2023; MEMO: Turkish Foreign Minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, said on Thursday that he could meet his Syrian counterpart, Faisal Mekdad, early in February, rejecting reports that the two could meet next week, Reuters reported.

Such a meeting would mark the highest-level talks between Ankara and Damascus since the Syrian war began in 2011, and signal a further thaw in ties.

Speaking on a live broadcast, Cavusoglu said there was no set date for the meeting but it would be held "as soon as possible".

ANKARA, Jan. 11 (Xinhua) -- Türkiye has ushered in the new year with significant pay hikes for minimum-wage earners, pensioners, and civil servants amid a cost-of-living crisis that has plunged millions into financial hardship.

Inflation remains alarmingly high despite a sharp drop to 64.2 percent in December, the Turkish Statistical Institute announced on Jan. 3, down from 84.3 percent reported in November after hitting a 24-year high in October.

ANKARA, January 11. /TASS/: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday that he supports the idea of organizing humanitarian corridors to evacuate wounded people from combat zones in Ukraine and other regions.

"[Turkey’s Chief Ombudsman] Seref [Malkoc] came up with an initiative to organize humanitarian corridors for evacuation of wounded people and we [Turkey] support this initiative," Erdogan said, speaking at the international conference ‘The Future of Human Rights in the 21st Century.’