Foreign & Security Policy

Articles

The return of returns: Europe’s migration debate, ten years after the EU-Turkey deal

Published: 10 March 2026

As the European Union moves forward with the Return Regulation, the lessons from Australia, Italy and the EU–Turkey deal are hard to ignore. Externalisation measures including offshore detention have repeatedly proven costly, legally fraught and damaging to human rights, while agreements with third countries often create dependencies and diminish the EU’s authority and influence.

Chrysiis Katsea

Strategic fault lines in the Middle East: Türkiye between Iran, Israel, and Syria

Published: 23 July 2025

Analysis

This analysis looks at the regional dynamics before and after the 12-Day War between Israel and Iran and analyzes the opportunities and challenges the War has presented for Türkiye. It argues that the weakening of Iran leaves Türkiye and Israel as the main rivals in the region’s strategic balance. Syria risks being the major theater where this rivalry could escalate.

Prof. Dr. Özlem Tür

Syrian refugees in Turkey on the way of Eid visit to their hometowns.

“Go and see” to return: Turkish policy and Syrian reality

Published: 15 April 2025

Article

While the fall of the Syrian regime on 8 December 2024 has significantly changed the political landscape, conditions in Syria are insufficient and unsafe for large-scale returns. From this perspective, Turkey’s “go-and-see” visit policy allows Syrians under temporary protection to assess the situation first-hand before deciding whether to return.

Omar Kadkoy

The European Union and China: Between strategic partnership and systemic competition

Published: 14 November 2024

Article

Although the EU regards China as “an economic competitor and a systemic rival”, it remains an attractive economic partner, investment source, and development model for Turkey. However, China’s distinct cultural, political, geographical and economic conditions, along with its sheer size, prevent it from being a complete model.

Doç. Dr. Çiğdem Nas

World Refugee Day 2024: Counteracting shipwreck

Published: 21 June 2024

Commentary

Migration and asylum have been at the top of the agenda in the EU for some time now. Thereby, the discussion is less about solving problems or addressing the suffering of people on the move, but more about preventing people from reaching European soil. This is neither good for the people seeking refuge in our continent, nor beneficial to the political debate on these issues.

Neda Noraie-Kia

European elections 2024: A wake-up call

Published: 12 June 2024

Analysis

After the European elections, the democratic and pro-European forces in the European Parliament (EP) have been weakened. They must make cooperation much more binding in order to ensure reliable majorities for an effective EU.

Jan Philipp Albrecht, Eva van de Rakt, Roderick Kefferpütz, Marc Berthold

Bretton Woods Revisited: Creating a Monetary and Economic Order Fit for the 21st Century

Published: 12 June 2024

Statement

Ahead of the 80th anniversary of the Bretton Woods Conference, together with partner institutions, we propose reforms in eight critical areas of the international economic and financial architecture to reflect the changing global realities and challenges.

Photo shows ethnic Uighurs during a protest against China near the Chinese Consulate in Istanbul in 2019

The Uyghur issue in Turkey-China relations

Published: 5 April 2024

Article

China is pleased with the AKP’s recent efforts to keep the Uyghur issue low profile compared to before, it still does not see Turkey as a reliable partner.

Nilgün Eliküçük Yıldırım

More articles about Foreign & Security Policy (25)

dossiers

Between two worlds: China Turkey relations

Published: 5 April 2024

Dossier

Where does Turkey position itself amidst the geopolitical rivalry between China and the US? What are the implications of Turkey's ties with China for its global positioning between Western and Eastern powers? Our expert contributors from Turkey provide insightful analyses of the China-Turkey partnership's driving factors, limitations, and prospects.

Feminist Foreign Policy and the South Caucasus

Published: 11 May 2023

Dossier

This dossier looks at the possibility of feminist foreign policy in the context of the South Caucasus, a region coined by armed conflict, destabilizing external interference and military threat, and all but feminist governments.

Publications

The European Pillar in NATO: From Hollow to Concrete

Published: 18 March 2026

Policy Paper

It is near consensual among Europeans that they need to strengthen the ‘European pillar in NATO’. This study traces the evolution of the concept of the European pillar, delineates potential meaning, and spells out what it would take to operationalize it.

Dr Leonard Schütte

Life in migrant neighbourhoods

Published: 29 November 2023

Research

The present research was undertaken to address the need for comprehensive data on the social integration or cohesion of migrants in Turkey. It discusses the findings of the quantitative and qualitative research in detail in subsequent sections.

Deniz Yükseker , Hatice Kurtuluş, Uğur Tekin, Esra Kaya Erdoğan

Watching the “Donors’ Conference for the People of Turkey and Syria”

Published: 17 March 2023

Booklet

The EU has hosted a Donors’ Conference for the victims of the Kahramanmaraş earthquakes on 20 March. Check out our new factsheet by Onur Bahçecik to learn more about the background of the high-level conference. What do international donations cover? Through which mechanisms are they distributed? And how are they monitored?

Dr. Şerif Onur Bahçecik

political-party-representation-of-anti-immigration-attitutes-the-case-turkey-cover.jpg

Political party representation of anti-immigration attitudes

Published: 3 March 2023

Research

Özyeğin University report analyses the attitudes of political parties in Turkey on the migration issue.

Deniz S. Sert, Ezgi Elçi, Evren Balta

Powering the hydrogen economy in Europe

Published: 16 January 2023

Research

In this report, Tolga Demiryol analyses Turkey’s role as a potential hydrogen supplier to Europe. The first section of the report provides the state-of-the-art on hydrogen and its likely role in energy transition. The second section explores the hydrogen strategy of the EU. The third section reviews the current state and potential of the hydrogen sector in Turkey. The last section evaluates the main policy challenges and next steps in hydrogen cooperation between the EU and Turkey.

Tolga Demiryol