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Today we discuss retiring diplomat and special envoy for Syria James Jeffrey’s latest bombshell interview in Defense One. In the interview, Ambassador Jeffrey praises President Trump’s approach to the Middle East, but also acknowledges that his team routinely misled senior leaders about troop levels in Syria. Jeffrey also touched on relations with Turkey, and recommends that President-elect...

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This week Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi travelled to Athens to meet with Prime Minister Mitsotakis. The visit underscores the growing relationship between Athens and Cairo, but also new dynamics in the Eastern Mediterranean. Both Greece and Egypt are at odds with Turkey for a number of varying reasons. Expert Steven Cook joins us for a deep dive into Cairo’s relations with...

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Journalist Angelos Athanasopoulos joins The Greek Current to analyze Turkey’s latest provocative decision to send the Oruc Reis research vessel into a new area south of the Greek island of Kastellorizo and near the island of Rhodes. We’ll also discuss a recent State Department report on violations of Greek airspace, and the visit by Egypt’s president to Greece.Angelos Athanasopoulos is the...

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Armenia’s Prime Minister took to Facebook early on Tuesday to announce that he had signed an “extremely painful” Russia and Turkey-backed ceasefire to halt the fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh with Azerbaijan. Expert Michael Rubin, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Pentagon official, joins The Greek Current to give us his latest analysis on this ceasefire...

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Dr. Aykan Erdemir - the co-author of the piece “Turkish Bank Rulings Should Be A Wakeup Call For Global Financial Institutions” - joins us to analyze two recent milestone court rulings in the Southern District of New York against Turkish banks Halkbank and Kuveyt Turk Bank, how these cases highlight Turkey’s terrorism and illicit finance problems, and more.Read Dr. Aykan Erdermir’s latest piece...

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This week, Concept Schools Inc., a charter school chain based in the Chicago area with links to Turkey and Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen, agreed on a multi-million dollar settlement to end a long-running federal corruption investigation. Dan Mihalopoulos joins us to break down this story, the links to Turkey, and how this charter school chain is connected to broader Turkish efforts to...

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The eyes of the world are on a couple of US states where election officials are still counting ballots. The outcome of those votes will determine who the next President of the US will be. As we wait for the official results, political scientist and expert Harris Mylonas joins to discuss his takeaways from this election, what he thinks the results we have so far tell us, and more. Harris Mylonas...

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Today, Volkswagen and Greece announced the launch of an exciting pilot project on the Greek island of Astypalea, in the Aegean. Under the plan, the current transport system on the island will transition to electric vehicles and renewable power generation, and in the long run, Astypalea will become a model island for climate-neutral mobility. Ilias Bellos, Kathimerini’s business editor, joins us...

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Professor Henri Barkey discusses his latest piece, “How Erdogan Muscled Turkey to the Center of the World Stage”, and points out the ways Erdogan has refashioned Turkey as a revisionist power openly challenging not just its neighbors, but also fellow NATO allies like France and the US.Henri Barkey is the Cohen Professor of International Relations at Lehigh University and an adjunct senior...

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A deadly earthquake struck in the Aegean Sea between the Turkish coast and the Greek island of Samos. The quake was felt as far as Athens and Istanbul. Despite heightened tensions between the two countries, both Greek and Turkish leaders issued messages of solidarity, offering each other assistance in a move reminiscent of Greece and Turkey’s earthquake diplomacy in 1999. Journalist Alexia...

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Expert Michael Rubin, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Pentagon official, joins us today to discuss his latest op-ed - “Brussels can stop Turkey’s aggression” - and explain what immediate actions he thinks European Union countries should take to check Erdogan’s aggressive behavior in the region.Read Michael Rubin’s op-eds here: Brussels can stop Turkey’s...

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HALC’s Executive Director Endy Zemenides joins us today to talk about OXI Day - the day that Greece celebrates its entry into World War II on the side of the Allies and its rejection of fascism - and the parallels we see between October 28, 1940, and today.You can read the articles we discuss on The Daily Roundup here:80th anniversary of OXI DayCharlie Hebdo: Turkey vows legal action over...

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On Monday the US recorded 74,300 new coronavirus cases as the outlook across the country continues to worsen. At the same time, Greece has also seen a dramatic rise in cases that has prompted fresh measures and localized lockdowns. Dr. Perry Halkitis joins the Greek Current to discuss these troubling trends, the current response in the US and Greece, and what to expect in the next months.You...

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Vassilis Nedos, the diplomatic and defense editor at Kathimerini, joins The Greek Current to discuss the latest developments in the Eastern Mediterranean, Greece’s diplomatic push to press its EU partners for an arms embargo against Turkey, the assistance provided by Germany, Italy, and Spain to Turkey in equipment and technological know-how, and more.You can read the articles we discuss on The...

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Following recent report by the Center for American Progress that recommends that a future US administration needs to recalibrate its relations with Turkey, expert Alan Makovsky offers his thoughts on what recalibrating US relations with #Turkey could look like. Alan Makovsky discusses what the US needs to do to re-establish leverage over Turkey, and more.Alan Makovsky is a senior fellow for...

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This week Greece stepped up diplomatic efforts to mobilize its European Union partners against Turkey, as Ankara continues its provocations in the Eastern Mediterranean near the Greek island of Kastellorizo. These diplomatic steps included a call for a halt on military exports to Turkey, a potential reevaluation of the EU’s customs union with Turkey, and an appeal for solidarity in line with...

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On Sunday, Ersin Tatar, a rightwing hardliner backed by Ankara, won a closely contested Turkish Cypriot leadership election beating incumbent Mustafa Akinci in a runoff. The election was marred by Turkey’s heavy-handed meddling in favor of Tatar. Dr. Aykan Erdemir, the senior director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies' Turkey program and a former member of the Turkish Parliament,...

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Expert Nikolas Katsimpras discusses his latest op-ed in the Greek newspaper Kathimerini focusing on Turkey’s lobbying efforts in the US, what Greece needs to be aware of, and the broader discussion in the West on combatting foreign influence and disinformation campaigns.Nikolas Katsimpras is a lecturer at Columbia University's Negotiation and Conflict Resolution program, an independent conflict...

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Ayla Jean Yackley, an Istanbul based journalist covering Turkey, joins The Greek Current to discuss two important stories. We examine the troubling move by Turkey’s judiciary to bring new indictments against Turkish philanthropist Osman Kavala and US Professor Henri Barkey, and look at the militarization of Turkey’s foreign policy. Ayla Jean Yackley’s work has featured in Al-Monitor, The...

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USCIRF held a briefing on religious freedom in Turkey on Thursday. The event highlighted recent and ongoing religious freedom concerns in Turkey, including the conversion of historic former churches such as Hagia Sophia and Chora into mosques; the targeting of religious minorities; and what these developments and practices mean for religious minorities throughout Turkey.Tugba Tanyieri Erdemir,...

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