Author: Marina Mattili

Turkey’s president defied expectations and saw off his rival in Sunday’s elections. But how did the country’s large European diaspora vote? Turkish elections are set to head a second round, after Sunday night’s result. Despite successive polls putting him ahead, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu – the incumbent president’s main rival – secured some 45% of the vote, with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan receiving 49% – 1% under the threshold needed to win the race outright. More than 5 million people of Turkish descent live in Europe and their votes impacted the results, with each politician having their own regional strongholds.  Around 3.4 million of them are registered…

In this edition of “Brussels, my love?”, we take a look at Germany’s role in Europe following Chancellor Scholz’s speech before the European Parliament and ask whether the belated ratification of the Istanbul Convention to fight violence against women was a relief – or an embarrassment. Euronews’ Brussels bureau brings you its latest episode of Brussels, my love, a weekly talk show that breaks down European news and politics. This week, we were joined at the European Parliament in Strasbourg by Maria Irish MEP Maria Walsh from the EPP, Swedish MEP Emma Wiesner from Renew and Polish MEP Robert Biedron…

Athens, Greece – When Notis Mitarakis took the job of migration minister, he received a baptism of fire. In January 2020, even before he was sworn in, Mitarakis visited his constituency of Chios. There were 100,000 asylum seekers in Greece, and half of them lived on the five eastern Aegean islands that had Reception and Identification Centres, including Chios. On average, there were almost 10,000 monthly new arrivals from Turkey. A crowd of angry islanders greeted him outside the town hall, where he was to attend a special municipal council on what to do about thousands of refugees who had overflowed…

The federal government has earmarked $3.4 billion over the next decade for an Advanced Strategic Capabilities Accelerator (ASCA) to develop advanced military technologies. The proposal is part of the Defence Strategic Review released last week, which recommends spending $19 billion over the next four years amid more effective support for innovation, faster acquisition and better links between Defence and industry, and increases the current planned spend on defence innovation by $557.5 million. The program will be a rapid response unit to changing technical capabilities and demands. The accelerator will focus on solving the most relevant technical issues, and taking a…

Russian fashion designer Valentin Yudashkin has died aged 59 after a long battle with cancer. Yudashkin is famous for wowing Paris Fashion Week with his Faberge collection in 1991, and clothing former Soviet first lady Raisa Gorbachev. But his Paris show was cancelled last year after he failed to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. His death comes two days after that of his teacher Slava Zaitsev, considered the USSR’s and Russia’s top couturier. Yudashkin set up his own fashion house in the 1990s, and is also known for designing the Russian team gear for the 1994 and 1996 Olympics and…

Romanian state-owned company Romgaz and Azerbaijani oil and gas company Socar will sign a new contract for the delivery of natural gas on Friday. Azerbaijan delivered the first quantities of natural gas to Romania in January, and the two state-run companies will sign a contract for new deliveries starting with April, Romanian President Klaus Iohannis said on Thursday after a meeting with his Azeri counterpart, Ilham Aliyev. Romania will continue to work with Azerbaijan on multiple energy projects, such as the Southern Gas Corridor – an EU initiative to secure a natural gas supply route from Caspian and Middle Eastern…

The volume of trade turnover between Turkmenistan and the EU countries from January through October 2022 has been announced. According to the information, during the reporting period, the trade turnover between Turkmenistan and the EU countries amounted to 816.94 million euros. According to the Eurostat, Turkmen exports to the EU countries amounted to 323.16 million euros from January through October 2022, which is 27 percent less than in the same period of 2021 (442.63 million euros). During this period, Turkmenistan imported goods worth 493.78 billion euros from EU countries. Meanwhile, the trade turnover between Turkmenistan and the EU countries amounted…

Russia will remain a threat to NATO even if its forces are defeated in Ukraine, a top military official in the Western alliance said on Thursday (19 January). “Whatever the outcome of the war, the Russians will most likely have similar ambitions … therefore the threat does not go away,” Admiral Rob Bauer, the chairman of NATO’s military committee, told reporters at the alliance’s Brussels headquarters. While Russian forces, equipment and ammunition have all been depleted by the war, NATO countries expect Moscow will try to rebuild and even strengthen its military capacity, Bauer said. “Is that three to five years?…

On January 16-17, 2023, the round of political consultations between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkmenistan and the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs of the French Republic was held in the Foreign Ministry of Turkmenistan. The delegation of Turkmenistan was headed by Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Vepa Hajiyev, and the French side was headed by Deputy Director of the Department of Continental Europe of the French Foreign Ministry Sylvain Guiaugue. Within the framework of the held meetings, a wide range of issues of bilateral cooperation in the political, trade, economic, cultural and humanitarian spheres was discussed. The…

Lithuania’s 2022 Freedom Prize was presented to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy via Petro Beshta, Kyiv’s ambassador in Vilnius, at a ceremony hosted by the parliament on January 13, the Day of Freedom Defenders, Report informs referring to LRT. In his video address to the award ceremony, Zelenskyy thanked the people of Lithuania for their support for Ukraine. “I want to thank you for not betraying freedom for a minute – and not only in these 323 brutal days of Russia’s inhuman war, when we have felt your support all the time,” the president said via video link from Kyiv. “And in many…