Turkish Territory Research Articles

Sorunları Abartmayın! Türkiye ve Avrupa Birliği Neden Boşanamaz?

This article explores why the European Union and Turkey have preferred to maintain the accession negotiations despite recent problems in their relations. It is argued that the crucial political and economic interdependence between the partners prevents them from ending stops them ending the accession negotiations. The European Union’s dependence on Turkey stems from its policy of using Turkey as a barrier between the problematic Middle East and the peaceful continent of Europe, the key role of Turkish territories in the European Union’s energy diversification policy, and the large Turkish market that attracts major companies from Germany and France, the two driving forces for European Union integration. Turkey is dependent on the European Union because it is the main source of Turkey’s modernization, has a large share in Turkey’s foreign trade and foreign direct investments, and benefits Turkey through the customs union. Terminating the accession negotiations would put the gains of both parties at risk.

EFFECTS OF FİLTRATİON PROCESS AND STORAGE TİME ON THE CHEMİCAL CHANGES AND SENSORY PROPERTİES OF OLİVE OİL EXTRACTED FROM TURKİSH USLU CULTİVAR

Upper Mesopotamia is a part of Turkish territory is the homeland of the olive tree with a wide range genetic resource. This is the first report on chemical composition and oxidative stability of olive oil extracted from Uslu cultivar grown locally in a small amount. In this research, a Turkish olive cultivar named as “Uslu” locally grown in Akhisar was used for production of monocultivar extra virgin olive oil by using Mobile Olive Oil Processing Unit”. Olive oil samples were bottled before and after filtration and stored up to 24 months. Some chemical properties such as free fatty acid content, peroxide value, moisture content, UV absorbance value, minor and major components (fatty acid composition, tocopherols, total phenol compounds and phenolic composition), were determined during storage for 24 months. Chemical parameters such as free fatty acid, peroxide value except UV absorption values of both filtered and unfiltered “Uslu” olive oil samples were in agreement with the trade standards of International Olive Council (IOC). Color values of EVOO changed from green to yellow while UV absorbance values altered during storage. Very low free fatty acidy (0.2%) values which are unusual for commercial olive oils in Turkey were obtained for filtered and unfiltered samples. A slight increase was seen for unfiltered sample at the end of storage. Filtration had no detectable effect on fatty acid profile. Filtered sample had higher total phenols (407.64±4.051 ppm) and α-tocopherol (237 and 123.31 ppm) contents than unfiltered ones and their contents decreased approximately 50% at the end of storage. Luteolin was the most abundant phenolic compound and its concentration decreased from 268.65±5.428 to 93.57±0.541ppm during storage. It seemed effect of filtration was more obvious on total phenolic contents. This study was good practice for producing premium extra virgin olive oil by using Mobile Olive Oil Processing Unit. The results obtained in this study showed that Uslu olive oils has a unique chemical composition and a good oxidative stability with high tocopherols and phenolics contents that are uncommon in most of the commercial olive oils.

Turkish Role of Syrian Crises

The role of Turkey towards Syria that has become arena of con-flict for various global and regional powers and everyone is looking for the role. Turkey was one where these forces had a role and attitudes towards the Syrian crisis and the most prominent of the Syrian regime change. And Turkey is seeking to impose their role in the crisis through cooperation with its factors and political and military, economic and social, Turkey did not resort to the use of military intervention effectively so far because it is well aware that it does not support entering battle is calculated in its results as it does not want to engage in an open war so it was interfering in the bombing of some state regulation sites (Daash) and some PKK sites its role is to confirm and inform everyone that it exists and Turkey strongly that in the course of this crisis and the movements of Turkey towards the crisis. Be calculated and coordinated and in line with the movements of the United States became clear in order to employ these capabilities available to support Turkey's role regional as main objectives in Turkey's regional policy and is to maintain a unified sovereign Turkish territory and integrity and achieve significant economic progress and strengthen the position of Turkey as a force pivotal regional by Decrease, Turkey has been able to adapt its policy in line with international and regional realities making Turkey is able to lead the region and take advantage of the collapse of the Arab national security system and the absence of balance in the region.

The Great Wall of Turkey: From „The Open-Door Policy” to Building Fortress?

Following outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Turkey recorded an unprecedented inflow of migrants from its southern neighbourhood. The policy of opened borders in the initial years of war contrasted to securitization, the search for international support and other similar policies, which countries usually adopt in cases of migration crises. However, rising numbers of Syrian migrants, the deterioration of Turkish relations with the Assad government and the engagement of the Kurds as another important party in the Syrian conflict resulted in the switch of the Turkish border policy. In 2014, President Erdoğan initiated the construction of over 800 km long barrier on the border with Syria with an aim to build similar fenced walls on the Iraqi and Iranian border in 2017. Main aim of this paper is to analyze the development of the Turkish border policy (particularly concerning the border with Syria) in the aftermath of the 2011 events in the Middle East and identify factors, which led up to the shift from the policy of welcoming to the policy of building „Fortress Turkey”. The first part of the paper will briefly summarize Turkish migration policy and focus on presenting the change of the initial ‘open’ approach to migration from Syria into the current state of building fences in the borderland. Subsequently, the paper will deal with selected factors, which might have caused this phenomenon. These include spread of terrorism and inflow of the Daesh fighters, who were using soft border regime to diffuse their activities to the Turkish territory; increase in smuggling and cross-border illegal trade; fears from the conflict spillover; but also territorial integrity concerns with regard to revival of the Kurdish activities in the region .

Evaluation of irregular migration governance in Turkey from a foreign policy perspective

AbstractThis article analyzes the extent to which Turkey’s irregular migration governance has evolved since the 1990s and the most salient factors in that process. Relying on the methods of process tracing and political ethnography, the article demonstrates that, since the early 1990s, Turkey’s irregular migration governance has been driven by the following factors: 1) responses to the European Union’s (EU) attempts to control migration through externalization; 2) Turkey’s national security concerns, which increased with the advent of mass migration from the Middle East; and 3) the increase in the number of irregular migrants on Turkish territory. The Syrian mass migration that began in 2011 gave momentum to the evolution of irregular migration governance in line with the long-term externalization on the part of the EU. Our analysis sheds light on the interconnectedness of irregular and mass migration, as well as on the outcomes of interactions between international politics and national migration governance. Thus, the article provides insights that will prove valuable for migration studies, EU studies, and studies on Turkish foreign policy.

Taoan Dialect of Georgian Language and Linguistic Space of Collective Memory in the Chorokhi Basin

In one of the provinces of historical South Georgia, on the modern Turkish territory, in Tao, intensive assimilation and large-scale migration processes resulted in a decrease of the Georgian-speaking space to a minimum and in the 21st century only a few Georgian speaking villages remained. The aim of the work “Taoan Dialect of Georgian Language and linguistic space of collective memory in the Chorokhi Basin” is to study the linguistic panorama in the narratives of the locals, based on the ethnological and dialectical materials gathered by the authors in the Parkklistskali valley expeditions. Besides this, the results of the research also reflect the structure of the Georgian settlements and some of the self-awareness issues that are presented in collective memory of the local population.Georgian villages are in the basin (Parkhlistskali) of the left tributary of the middle wing of the river Chorokhi. The authors point to the specifics of Khevay, Kobay and Balkhi Georgians: it is not argued that one dialect is spoken within the mentioned villages, but at the same time the local population distinguishes certain peculiarities of the inhabitants of some small gorges. In this regard, the work is of significant novelty, especially if one of its foundations is completely new material gathered in the fields of expeditions in the villages and districts of the study area, which are introduced into scientific circulation for the first time.

MCDM analysis of wind energy in Turkey: decision making based on environmental impact.

Development of new wind energy projects require complex planning process involving many social, technical, economic, environmental, political concerns, and different agents such as investors, utilities, governmental agencies, or social groups. The aim of this study is to develop a tool combining Geographic Information System (GIS) and Multi-Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM) methodologies, and its application for Turkey as a case study. A variety of constraints and criteria were identified based on a literature review and regulations gathered from variety of agencies, use of which resulted in determination of infeasible sites. Then, pairwise comparisons were carried out using analytic hierarchy process as the MCDM method to estimate relative importance of the criteria, and to visualize a suitability map with three classes. As the final stage, decision making was carried out based on environmental impact where 45.5% of the Turkish territory was found as infeasible area. Sixty percent of the remaining area are covered by the moderate suitability class, followed by the highly suitable area (20.3%) and low suitable area (19.8%). The output of this study can be used by energy planners to estimate the extent that wind energy can be developed based on public perception, administrative, and environmental aspects.

Ambrogio Contarini i jego podróż na Wschód. Okoliczności nawiązania kontaktów dyplomatycznych przez Wenecję i Polskę z Persją w drugiej połowie XV w.

Artykuł poświęcony jest mało znanemu w historiografii wątkowi dyplomatycznych kontaktów pomiędzy Europą chrześcijańską a Uzun Hassanem (1423-1478), władcą Persji. Stolicą jego państwa było, leżące obecnie w północno-zachodnim Iranie miasto Tabriz. Uzun Hassan wspierał militarnie przeciwników Turcji osmańskiej i dążył do nawiązania kontaktów dyplomatycznych z państwami chrześcijańskimi. Autor krótko przedstawił dzieje tych poselstw, których celem była zazwyczaj Wenecja i Rzym. W 1472 r. jedno z nich zawitało również do stolicy Królestwa Polskiego Krakowa. Poza krótkimi wzmiankami we współczesnych kronikach i dokumentach dyplomatycznych niewiele wiemy o szczegółach tych pierwszych politycznych kontaktów z Persją. Zasadnicza część artykułu odnosi się natomiast do niezwykle dobrze udokumentowanej źródłowo podróży na dwór Uzun Hassana w Tabriz weneckiego posła Ambrogio Contariniego. W dyplomatyczną podróż wyprawił się on z Wenecji w lutym 1474 r. Ponieważ Turcy w owym czasie blokowali przeprawę z Cypru do Azji Mniejszej wenecki poseł zdecydował się na podróż lądem poprzez Niemcy, Królestwo Polskie i Ruś. Niezwykle cenne są jego opisy mało znanych regionów leżących nad Dnieprem, w tym samego Kijowa. Szczegółowo opisał swoją pełną przygód podróż kierując się do Kaffy nad Morzem Czarnym. Stamtąd omijając posiadłości tureckie i góry Kaukazu, uniknąwszy wielu niebezpieczeństw Contarini przedostał się do Persji.

INTELLIGENCE COOPERATION BETWEEN THE SECOND REPUBLIC OF POLAND AND THE REPUBLIC OF TURKEY. PART II – THE 1930s

In the period between the two World Wars, Turkey played quite an important role in the security system of the Second Republic of Poland, especially after the May Coup in 1926. Poland promoted the establishment of the Central European Bloc, which in some variants would also include Turkey. Furthermore, the state played an important role in the Polish Promethean politics because it had borders with the Caucasus, and in addition there was the large Caucasian emigration. As early as in the 1920s Poland initiated intelligence cooperation with Turkey against the USSR, as a result of which Polish intelligence missions operated in the Turkish territory and Turkish intelligence officers underwent specialized training in Poland. The more Turkey approached the Western countries before the outbreak of World War II the more this cooperation intensified.

Bullinger on Islam: Theory and Practice

Abstract: The present inquiry engages with the perception of Islam and of Christian-Muslim relations in the works of the sixteenth-century Zurich Reformer Heinrich Bullinger (1504–1575). On the basis of previous research, it attempts to deepen our understanding of the Reformer’s theory of Islam by comparing it with the notions of true and false prophecy. This theological perspective is broadened by a discussion of Bullinger’s more practical advice on the Christian presence in Turkish territories and on evangelization of Muslims. These themes are explored through the Reformer’s correspondence, his 1551 catechetical letter to Hungarian Protestants, and his 1567 systematic and polemical exposition of Islam (Der Türgg).

A probabilistic seismic hazard assessment for the Turkish territory: part II—fault source and background seismicity model

Over the years, several local and regional seismic hazard studies have been conducted for the estimation of the seismic hazard in Turkey using different statistical processing tools for instrumental and historical earthquake data and modeling the geologic and tectonic characteristics of the region. Recently developed techniques, increased knowledge and improved databases brought the necessity to review the national active fault database and the compiled earthquake catalogue for the development of a national earthquake hazard map. A national earthquake strategy and action plan were conceived and accordingly with the collaboration of the several institutions and expert researchers, the Revision of Turkish Seismic Hazard Map Project (UDAP-C-13-06) was initiated, and finalized at the end of 2014. The scope of the project was confined to the revision of current national seismic hazard map, using the state of the art technologies and knowledge of the active fault, earthquake database, and ground motion prediction equations. The following two seismic source zonation models are developed for the probabilistic earthquake hazard analysis: (1) Area source model, (2) Fault and spatial smoothing seismic source model (FSBCK). In this study, we focus on the development and the characterization of the Fault Source model, the background spatially smoothed seismicity model and intrinsic uncertainty on the earthquake occurrence-rates-estimation. Finally, PSHA results obtained from the fault and spatial smoothed seismic source model are presented for 43, 72, 475 and 2475 years return periods (corresponding to 69, 50, 10, and 2% probability of exceedance in 50 years) for PGA and 5% damped spectral accelerations at 0.2 and 1.0 s.

COMPARISON OF ASTER AND SRTM DIGITAL ELEVATION MODELS AT ONE-ARC-SECOND RESOLUTION OVER TURKEY

In February 2000, the “Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM)” satellite captured elevation data by scanning the Earth landmasses between the 60 o North and South latitudes. After the mission of 11 days, the collected data were processed, and a Digital Elevation Model (DEM) within one arc-second resolution for United States and three arc-second resolutions for the other parts of the globe was created and published on the NASA servers. Recently, a global SRTM DEM with one-arc-second resolution has been released. Additionally, ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) is a sensor boarded on the Terra satellite in 1999. The sensor has been collecting satellite imagery since 2000. The ASTER GDEM at one-second resolution was released to the public, which is the most complete DEM of the earth ever made. In this study, SRTM and ASTER DEMs with one arc-second resolution over Turkish territory was evaluated by means of a local DEM produced from 1:25K national topographic maps. Results show that the accuracy of the SRTM DEM is better than the ASTER GDEM with respect to the local DEM.

Against All Odds: Turkey’s Response to “Undesirable but Unreturnable” Asylum-Seekers

This article critically analyses Turkish legislation and practice regulating the status of “undesirable but unreturnable” asylum-seekers, who are suspected and/or convicted of criminality but cannot be removed from Turkey due to the principle of non-refoulement, questioning how the issue is tackled by the Turkish State. The current political situation in the region having forced it to change and update its legislation, it has created a temporary protection regimen to handle refugee influxes, a subsidiary protection regime, and other categories of staying permits for foreigners who cannot be removed from Turkish territory. Beyond the political situation, its legal and judicial initiatives are, however, affected by its international and regional legal obligations, as European Court of Human Rights case law demonstrates. There is limited information as to how many exclusion-triggered cases are processed and how many refugees are excluded and what happens to those who are excluded after this decision. Furthermore, Turkey’s situation might be untenable, as it is the main transit hub for foreign terrorist fighters and people fleeing the Syrian and Iraqi conflicts.

A probabilistic seismic hazard assessment for the Turkish territory—part I: the area source model

The seismic zoning map of Turkey that is used in connection with the national seismic design code (versions issued both in 1997 and 2007) is based on a probabilistic seismic hazard assessment study conducted more than 20 years ago (Gulkan et al. in En son verilere gore hazirlanan Turkiye deprem bolgeleri haritasi, Report No: METU/EERC 93-1, 1993). In line with the efforts for the update of the seismic design code, the need aroused for an updated seismic hazard map, incorporating recent data and state-of-the-art methodologies and providing ground motion parameters required for the construction of the design spectra stipulated by the new Turkish Earthquake Design Code. Supported by AFAD (Disaster and Emergency Management Authority of Turkey), a project has been conducted for the country scale assessment of the seismic hazard by probabilistic methods. The present paper describes the probabilistic seismic hazard assessment study conducted in connection with this project, incorporating in an area source model, all recently compiled data on seismicity and active faulting, and using a set of recently developed ground motion prediction equations, for both active shallow crustal and subduction regimes, evaluated as adequately representing the ground motion characteristics in the region. The area sources delineated in the model are fully parameterized in terms of maximum magnitude, depth distribution, predominant strike and dip angles and mechanism of possible ruptures. Resulting ground motion distributions are quantified and presented for PGA and 5 % damped spectral accelerations at T = 0.2 and 1.0 s, associated with return periods of 475 and 2475 years. The full set of seismic hazard curves was also made available for the hazard computation sites. The second part of the study, which is based on a fault source and smoothed seismicity model is covered in Demircioglu et al. in Bull Earthq Eng, (2016).

Merkel, Erdogan and “Syrian refugees”. Background and consequences of the migration crisis

This article analyzes the reasons behind the grand-scale migration flow to Europe. It is argued that under the mask of “Syrian refugees” more than a million of migrants from different countries came to the continent. The prerequisite for inviting the migrants was a need for extra manpower due to the decision to execute an agreement between the EU and the USA on the implementation of a program of Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). At the same time, the German leaders expected to replenish the catastrophically decreasing population size by migrants. However, during the realization of the project on migrants’ attraction it turned out that instead of the supposed Syrians in a crowd of migrants the people from two dozens of nations, including Islamic radicals, moved to Europe. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, the initiator of such a massive refugees’ admission, had to sign an agreement with Turkey on the return of a substantial part of refugees in exchange for the promise of a visa-free regime for the citizens of Turkey, paying off Ankara’s costs for the maintenance of refugee camps within Turkish territory, as well as the assistance in admission of Turkey to the EU membership. However, there is no understanding between the EU members on the decisions made. Moreover, there is a growing comprehension of the fact that Turkey has its own nationalistic interests which it intends to promote through the Islamic presence in Europe.

National level landslide susceptibility assessment of Turkey utilizing public domain dataset

Landslide studies have been integrated into geographic information systems with the help of technological developments using several methods like inventory, heuristic, statistic and deterministic methods in the recent years. However, since a nationwide landslide susceptibility zoning map has not been produced for the entire territory of Turkey, this study aims to produce a landslide susceptibility map of Turkey at a national scale by utilizing publicly available datasets. In order to develop a landslide susceptibility map of Turkey at the scale of 1:2,000,000, an index-based calculation, which considers six factors (slope, lithology, local relief, rainfall, land use, seismicity) that covers the entire territory of Turkey and controls the occurrence of landslides, was applied in a 500 × 500 m pixel resolution. Each layer (factor) having various effects on landslide susceptibility has been merged into the model with assigned weights. Four different weight groups were assigned to the layer sets through expert judgement in order to capture the layer variability for landslide susceptibility in Turkey. The performances of four different weight groups were compared and evaluated by using a receiver operator characteristics curve for minimizing the uncertainty of expert judgement procedure. It was observed that the W3 group was superior to the other weight groups in prediction skills. The susceptibility map of W3 has been classified into five groups: no, low, moderate, high and very high susceptibility. The no susceptibility class represents 4.2 % of the Turkish territory (plains and low hills), low susceptibility class 36.4 %, medium susceptibility 8.3 %, high susceptibility 47.5 % and very high susceptibility class 3.6 %, mostly in the western and middle Black Sea regions, respectively.

Present-day glaciation of Western Asia (on the Turkey territory)

Mean annual air temperatures, total amount of precipitation, current state of glaciers and changes of their areas on some mountains of the Turkish territory are analyzed. The following regions are considered: East-Pontus Mountains, south-eastern part of the Taurus Mountains, volcanic regions Tendurek, Erciyes, and volcanic zone around the Wang Lake. There are seventy glaciers in these regions with their total area of 16.5 km2. It is shown that mostly the present-day glaciers are in state of degradation, and the rock glaciers are typical among them.

Visual-material evidence of viking presence in the Balkans

Abstract The Swedish and Norwegian Vikings were present in the Balkans including in Bulgaria. The archaeological and visual materials found on the Romanian, Bulgarian and Turkish territory support this statement. The majority of the objects constitute parts of weapons and tools related to the Scandinavian warfare. Most of these artifacts were discovered in North East of Bulgaria close to the Romanian border. They can be attributed to the Rus princes (father and son): Igor I (912–945) and Svyatoslav I Igorevich (942–972) who passed by the Bulgarian lands in the 10-th century and the Norwegian prince Harald who supported the Byzantine Empire to cause the downfall of the First Bulgarian kingdom at the beginning of the next century. Despite this sorrowful reputation, though, the Viking material culture in Bulgaria, Romania and Istanbul gives evidence to the multicultural mosaic of our region. It also enriches the Balkan history and culture. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to outline the Viking objects discovered in the Balkans.

Response to: Avicenna, a Persian scientist

In spite of strange claim of Mazicioglu [1] about Turkish origin of Avicenna, he was obviously a Persian scientist. Although it is too obvious, I present some evidence to clarify the subject. When we talk about Avicenna, we should look at the geographical situation of region 1000 years ago (Old Persia). It was too different from the current status. Avicenna was born in Afshaneh, the small city near the Balkh. It was one of the cities located in Khorasan Province of Iran in those days (Fig. 1). This region was separated from Iran by Russians only less than 200 years ago. Also, Afghanistan was independent from Iran in the same time. Most of the eastern parts of Afghanistan (like Herat) were a part of Khorasan Province in those days [2]. Turkish nationality originated from Turk tribes who lived in the east of Persia before Islam (before 637 AD). They tried to attack the western civilized territories, but Sassanids (Persian dynasty, 224–637 AD) stopped them at the eastern borders of Persia. Bahrām Chobin, the Persian commander defeated the Turkish army in the last years of the sixth century AD [3]. But, after Islam, Turkish territories were captured by Muslims and they became Muslim. Centuries later, some of them immigrated to the east with political and military powers and located in Anatolia (current Turkey) and changed the nationality of the region. On the other hand, Ozbaks, as wilderness tribes immigrated to this region under the command of Muhammad Shaybani Khan in the late sixteenth century AD (six centuries after Avicenna) [4]. The people who lived there were Persians. Parthians, one of three most important branches of ancient Persians is one of these examples. They ruled Persia from 247 BC to 224 AD [5]. Bukhara in Avicenna’s time was the capital of Samainds, the Iranian dynasty. Also, Khawrazm (Khawrazm) and Samarkand two main cities in this era were the capitals of Iran during Khwarazmian dynasty (1077–1231 AD), a bit after Avicenna’s death [6]. Avicenna had no Turkish manuscript. He wrote his scientific works in Arabic (as lingua franca of that time) and Persian (as his native language). At the Islamic time, transfers of cultural and scientific issues between nations were too high. We can find too many herbs and natural remedies called in Greek, Indian and other languages in most of the manuscripts written by Muslim scientists in that era. Regarding this, it is not a testimony for their nationality. In addition, the Mazicioglu letter contains historical errors. Avicenna did not just spend some of his last days in Hamadan; but he spent most of his life in various Persian cities like Gorgan, Ghazvin, Isfahan and Hamadan. He was the minister of Shams al-Dawla, the Buyid dynasty Ruler of Hamadan. He wrote his main books Shafa and canon of medicine in this city [7]. Also, I should talk about a very strange claim of the author about transferring initial medical sciences from Egypt to Greece in ancient time and then, developing it by Turkish scientists in the Islamic era. As it is known, humoral theory of medicine was presented by Indians and This reply refers to the comment available at doi:10.1007/s00404-015-3757-3.

PROBABILISTIC SEISMIC HAZARD MAPS FOR ADANA PROVINCE IN TURKEY

Turkey is located in a highly seismic region, where Mw > 6.5 earthquakes take place in every 10 year. According to the seismic zonation map of Turkey, approximately 42 % of the Turkish territory is located in the most seismic prone zone, known as Zone I. The other seismic zones are termed as Zone II, III and IV from the second severe to the least severe one. In this paper, we investigated the seismicity of Adana Province that is situated on four different seismic zones (i.e. Zone I to IV). Accordingly, we developed probabilistic seismic hazard maps of Adana for 475 year return period for stiff and soft site conditions. The probabilistic seismic hazard maps are presented in terms of PGA. The comparative maps indicate remarkable differences between proposed PGA values and the current design PGA values provided by the seismic zonation map and Turkish Earthquake Code