President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Monday will chair a Cabinet meeting in Ankara. The meeting will focus on the impact of the regional tensions, particularly the U.S.-Israel-Iran war, on the Turkish economy, media reports said on Sunday. Other topics on the agenda include the terror-free Türkiye plan and new developments in unresolved high-profile cases involving the disappearance and suspected murders of young women.

On the economic sides, the fight against inflation will be on the table. The ministers will discuss the effects of conflicts in the Middle East on the country’s economy. Specific discussions will focus on rising energy prices and how it will reflected on Turkish economy. Erdoğan and his ministers will talk about measures to limit the impact, media outlets reported.

Additionally, the Cabinet will hold consultations about the terror-free Türkiye initiative for disarmament of the terrorist group PKK. Reports by authorities monitoring the disarmament will be discussed at the meeting. The progress in the process runs parallel with planned legal amendments to determine the future of the terrorist group’s members. A timetable on legal steps, such as lenient sentencing for surrendering members of the PKK will likely be discussed by the Cabinet.

The suspected murder of Gülistan Doku, a young woman who went missing in the eastern province of Tunceli six years ago, will be another highlight of the meeting. New steps to speed up the resolution of unsolved cases will be on the agenda of the government. Doku is suspected to have been murdered but her case has been shelved after an incessant search across Tunceli did not yield any result.

The case was reopened this year upon new evidence pointing out that the son of Tunceli’s former governor may have had a hand in the disappearance of Doku. He was arrested last month and soon after, his father was also arrested amid reports that he covered up the murder.

After new details emerged in the case, the government pledged resolutions for other well-known unresolved cases, including the death of Rabia Naz Vatan, a young girl from northern province of Giresun and the death of Rojin Kabaiş, a university student who went missing in the eastern province of Van before her body was found near Lake Van.

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The terror-free Türkiye initiative, launched in 2024, heads to another critical month. Authorities plan to implement a new strategy to force the PKK terrorist group to speed up the disarmament. In the meantime, some regulations, including a review of the trustee practice for municipalities accused of links to the PKK and the state of PKK convicts with serious illnesses, will likely be under the spotlight as the steps that do not require comprehensive legal amendments.

The PKK slowed down the disarmament process after the U.S.-Israel attacks on Iran. The slowdown was nothing new in the initiative as the group dragged its feet again earlier this year when its Syria wing, YPG, violently resisted the integration process with Damascus. The situation in Syria was restored to normalcy when the YPG agreed to continue the integration.

Nowadays, Türkiye aims to persuade the PKK to speed up the process by pushing the group’s jailed ringleader, Abdullah Öcalan, to give further instructions for disarmament, through talks with the Barzani and Talabani political dynasties, which control Northern Iraq, where the PKK’s senior cadres are hiding out, and with the United States, which openly backed the YPG in Syria during the Syrian civil war. Authorities will corner the PKK further in Iraq. Recently, U.S. President Donald Trump questioned the fate of weapons he admitted supplying to “Kurds” during the U.S.-Israel-Iran war, while reports indicate that the said weapons are stored in the PKK’s hideouts.

Türkiye has dismissed reports that the initiative came to a halt. The ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) set up a timetable for the initiative, and the timetable indicates that any legal amendments for the reintegration of PKK members are out of question without confirmation of the PKK’s full dissolution. On April 29, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan assured that the initiative is ongoing.

Addressing the parliamentary group meeting of the AK Party, Erdoğan said the process was in its due course. “Those bringing about pessimistic scenarios about the process act upon their own doubts rather than the facts. There is a positive atmosphere right now. There are things to do, and the process is continuing as it is expected to continue,” he underlined.

“Despite all blatant and secret sabotage attempts, the initiative is now past its 18th month, and we have passed many critical thresholds. With the approval of the committee’s reports, we have arrived at another turning point in which we have to act sensibly,” he said. He was referring to a report of proposals to Parliament by a parliamentary committee on the initiative.

“We hope to go past this turning point without any problems with the support of political parties,” he said.

Erdoğan stressed that they did not heed “empty talk by certain circles about the process.” He reiterated his remarks to journalists on April 23 and underlined that “the atmosphere is positive.”

“Nothing will change in the process as those seeking to prolong the problem had hoped. We set out on this path to remove one of the biggest obstacles before Türkiye. We set out to eliminate sinister plots in the wider region, to remove the dagger stuck on our brotherhood,” he said.

He noted that those posing a challenge to the initiative and those seeking to incite tensions based on the initiative would not be remembered well. Erdoğan urged everyone to act responsibly and avoid rhetoric that would harm the initiative.

Elsewhere, the technical preparations are underway for how to handle the next steps in the disarmament, namely, the surrender of PKK members, subsequent legal proceedings and the fate of weapons that the PKK will lay down. Last year, the PKK inaugurated the disarmament via a symbolic ceremony where its members threw rifles into a fire pit, but this was the only public display of the disarmament.

For concrete legal steps, the government will await the outcome of the “confirmation process” in disarmament, something supervised by the intelligence. Once the confirmation process is concluded, Parliament will start working on bills.

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Türkiye’s National Intelligence Organization (MIT) has filed a criminal complaint against a fugitive figure linked to the 2016 assassination of Russia’s ambassador to Ankara, marking a significant development in the long-running investigation, according to security sources.

The complaint, submitted to the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, targets Abdullah Bozkurt, a Sweden-based suspect with ties to the Gülenist Terrorist Group (FETÖ), which orchestrated the defeat coup of July 15, 20216, in which 252 people were killed and 2,734 wounded. FETÖ is also behind a long-running campaign to overthrow the state through the infiltration of Turkish institutions, particularly the military, police and judiciary.

Officials allege Bozkurt played a central role in both directing the assassination and conducting disinformation campaigns against Türkiye and its intelligence institutions.

The move comes nearly a decade after Russian Ambassador Andrey Karlov was shot dead in December 2016 by off-duty police officer Mevlüt Mert Altıntaş at an art exhibition in Ankara, in an attack that shocked the international community and tested Ankara-Moscow ties.

According to findings cited in the complaint and previous trial files, Bozkurt is accused of influencing and directing Altıntaş through FETÖ-linked networks. Investigators say the gunman was radicalized in an organizational “cell house” in Ankara and was instructed not to surrender after carrying out the assassination.

Authorities further allege that Bozkurt used a foreign-based media platform to publish what they described as “false, distorted and manipulative” content targeting Türkiye and MIT, framing it as part of a broader psychological operation. The complaint calls for the prosecution not only of Bozkurt but also of others involved in producing and disseminating such material, as well as the removal of related content.

Security sources say the assassination was part of a broader plot orchestrated by FETÖ operatives over a two-year period, aimed at undermining Turkish-Russian relations and potentially triggering a wider geopolitical crisis.

Bozkurt, who resides in Stockholm, remains a wanted fugitive. Ankara has repeatedly requested his extradition, but Swedish courts have ruled that the charges do not meet the threshold for extradition under local law. Turkish officials maintain that he is among several senior FETÖ figures operating abroad, particularly in Europe and the United States.

An unknown number of FETÖ members, mostly high-ranking figures, fled Türkiye when the coup attempt was thwarted. Many of the group’s members had already left the country before the coup attempt after Turkish prosecutors launched investigations into other crimes of the terrorist group.

While the U.S., which housed FETÖ ringleader Fetullah Gülen until his death in October 2024, is the subject of most extradition requests, several EU countries like Sweden and Germany also harbor senior FETÖ members. Türkiye is looking to extradite hundreds of other so-called senior members of FETÖ from the U.S., and 257 from European Union countries, including 77 from Germany.

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Jean-Pierre Lacroix, the United Nations under-secretary-general for peace operations, will visit Italy and Türkiye from May 4 to 7 for a series of meetings focused on international peacekeeping efforts, a U.N. official said Friday.

Deputy spokesman Farhan Haq told reporters that Lacroix will begin his trip in Rome, where he is scheduled to hold bilateral discussions with Italian government officials on May 4-5, “to discuss peacekeeping-related issues.”

Following his meetings in Rome, Lacroix will travel to Brindisi, Italy, to participate in a conference marking the 20th anniversary of the United Nations Standing Police Capacity (SPC).

The SPC is a rapidly deployable police capability of the U.N., designed to strengthen the early policing response in peace operations and other mission settings.

Lacroix will conclude his trip in Türkiye’s capital, Ankara, on May 7, where he is set to meet Turkish officials, Haq said.

He will “discuss Türkiye’s support to United Nations peacekeeping, including as a police contributing country,” he added.

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The elections have been a two-handed game in the past two decades, thanks to the Justice and Development Party’s (AK Party) incomparable success. Its main rival, the Republican People’s Party (CHP), fights for political survival amid internal friction and mounting allegations of corruption. Smaller parties continue to calculate the risks of aligning with it in the next election and going alone or through a separate alliance against the AK Party and its beloved leader, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Erdoğan has been a game-changer in Türkiye’s democratic history and has been at the helm of Türkiye’s longest since the founder, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, as prime minister and president. After more than two decades in power, his AK Party is still ahead according to some opinion polls. In others, the party has a narrow gap with the CHP, while neither of the parties’ rivals comes close. For instance, an April survey by Optimar shows the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) scored 9.6% after the CHP, while another poll from March by Genar indicates the DEM Party can secure 8.9% of the vote after the AK Party and the CHP.

According to the official figures, there are 188 political parties in Türkiye. Most remain functional in name only, while several among them have less than 100 members, and maybe even fewer voters. The abundance of parties is a sign of the democratic wealth of the country, which has gone through three coups and more attempts by the military to interfere in politics. It is also a blessing for bigger, older parties, which usually rely on voter behavior to side with the winning side in the elections, though their loyalty might lie elsewhere at other times.

Some are “relics” not in the true sense of the word, but rather, due to the waning popularity of political views they defended. Those relics also include spiritual successors of once-popular parties. The newcomers referred to in the title, meanwhile, are mostly founded by dissidents of bigger parties, though some among them are truly new to politics, seeking to garner votes from those dissatisfied with the course their old parties took, namely the AK Party, the CHP and the AK Party’s ally, the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP).

Here are likely winners and losers of the next election scheduled to be held in 2028, although AK Party signaled that it may be rescheduled to the fall of 2027. Wins and losses, however, can be limited to the parliamentary seats as the AK Party and the CHP will likely dominate the polls again, based on recent surveys.

Key Party

The “A Party,” as it formally refers to itself, was founded in 2024 by Yavuz Ağıralioğlu, a 54-year-old former lawmaker who made his foray into politics in the Great Unity Party (BBP) before switching to the Good Party (IP) in 2018, only to resign in 2023. The party has set out to be a “key” to what it called “a deadlock in the system,” according to its manifesto, a reference apparently to the unending race between the AK Party and CHP. This was affirmed by Ağıralioğlu in a recent interview. He also claimed that the party has become popular among voters of the AK Party, MHP and IP, and to a degree, the CHP. With former AK Party and IP members among its founders and executive board, the A Party inevitably set its politics strictly to the right and its proposed policies, such as immediate deportation of all migrants and Syrian refugees, draw comparisons to fellow underdogs in the political scene.

Soon after its foundation, the party joined the growing list of political pundits’ “third-way parties” in the face of the AK Party and the CHP domination. In the ideological sense, it does not offer an all-embracing approach, but it managed to make it to the opinion polls, scoring slightly above 1% in Optimar’s survey. Areda-Survey’s poll put it above 4%. The party is not intent on being a part of future alliance against or with the AK Party, but as a quote attributed to late veteran politician Süleyman Demirel says, “Even 24 hours is a long time in politics,” and this stand may change in an instant when the election season begins.

New Welfare Party

Often leading or trailing behind the A Party in opinion polls, the YRP proved its potential in the 2024 municipal elections by securing more than 6% of the vote. Founded in 2018 by Fatih Erbakan, son of former Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, it follows the path of the late politician, specifically “National View” ideology, something also shared by the Felicity Party (SP). The YRP allied with the People’s Alliance of the AK Party and MHP in 2023 before parting ways after the elections.

Younger Erbakan seeks to build upon the legacy of his father, who managed to rally disenfranchised conservative voters stuck in center-right parties for decades. Erbakan’s “National View,” which also sought to attract voters with wildly different world views, especially through anti-imperialist elements of the ideology, made the now-defunct Welfare Party (RP) a rising star in the politics of the 1990s. The RP is where President Erdoğan honed his political and oratory skills, and the AK Party has managed to attract some of its former supporters when the party was closed and its reincarnation, the Virtue Party (FP), was split.

The YRP did not veer much from the RP in its policies and mainly targeted voters who were adherents of the National View and disillusioned with the AK Party’s changing ways, specifically the widening political spectrum of the party. A rise in the polls indicates that this strategy may work. Forty-seven-year-old Erbakan is among the youngest of the leaders of prominent parties, but age has rarely been a determining factor in the choices of voters in multiparty elections since 1950.

The party recently tried to lure voters critical of the government’s policies toward Israel, adopting a rhetoric that the AK Party was not doing much to stop Israel’s genocide in Gaza and its power in the international community. It is unclear how it may bring more votes to the party, where the economic challenges are expected to be a more significant factor in the choices of the voters in the next election.

The YRP does not favor another bid in the People’s Alliance, but it is open to aligning with the SP in the next election. Though Erbakan is confident about going solo, he also signaled openness to allying with other parties as well, including the Democracy and Progress (DEVA) and the Future Party (GP), which were founded by former members of the AK Party.

DEVA and GP

Although they are separate entities under Turkish laws, DEVA and GP are almost one in their policies and voter base. This eventually led to an alliance in the parliament under the New Path banner, together with the SP.

The DEVA was founded in 2020 by Former Minister Ali Babacan, once a rising young politician in the AK Party. He apparently followed the example of former Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, who established SP one year before. In the 2023 elections, both parties relied on the main opposition to secure parliamentary seats, while they had no dream of having their own candidates against Erdoğan and his rival, CHP’s Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. Babacan and Davutoğlu succeeded in convincing former AK Party supporters, including former ministers and those who served on the AK Party boards. Yet, this has not been enough to pass the electoral threshold.

Like the parties above, they can be lumped with right-wing or center-right parties, and their policies do not differ much from the AK Party’s policies in the early 2000s. Indeed, they have more in common with the AK Party than the six-party bloc they supported against Erdoğan in 2023. Their alliance with the opposition will likely continue in the next election, though they may prefer siding with the FP and the YRP instead of the CHP. Defeat of the CHP’s candidate Kılıçdaroğlu in the 2023 elections cost the main opposition party’s chair his seat but also revealed seething anger among CHP supporters against DEVA and FP lawmakers who won seats with CHP loyalists’ votes. The FP and DEVA were accused of being freeloaders who run under the CHP banner in the legislative elections in exchange for voicing their support for Kılıçdaroğlu’s candidacy. This mounting criticism effectively shut the door to another alliance, though both parties still appear to be on good terms with the CHP administration after Kılıçdaroğlu was replaced with Özgür Özel following his devastating electoral loss.

Good Party

Once hailed as the primary alternative to the MHP, IP now floats somewhere between a hub for nationalists who fell out with the MHP due to its proliferating alliance with the AK Party and a stopover or last destination for CHP voters believing that the party is too left-wing for their taste. The IP’s sole ideological compass adhering to the right-wing politics of yesteryear may bring in votes from the elderly voters, unlike the Victory Party (ZP), which appears to lure much younger voters despite a similar policy with the IP.

The party’s membership and poll numbers show a downward trend, as voters who prioritize national stability increasingly return to the MHP or look toward newer nationalist experiments. The party now faces the risk of becoming a “relic” before it ever truly matures, as it struggles to convince the public that it offers anything more than a diluted version of the MHP’s robust nationalism, willing to take risks for sustaining the state.

Party Chair Müsavat Dervişoğlu underlined that they were not open to alliances, especially establishing a “nationalist league” and relying on what little support it has to run in the future elections independently. Any future alliance may further erode the support, as the 2023 elections demonstrated.

Victory Party

One of the youngest parties, the ZP was founded in 2021 by 65-year-old Ümit Özdağ. Özdağ’s easygoing public image and oratory skills helped the party to attract voters at a time of rising anti-migrant, anti-refugee sentiment in the public. A diehard nationalist, Özdağ tempted impressionable youth with his radical discourse, which is blamed for notorious riots against migrants and refugees.

Unfortunately for the ZP, this appears to be the only thing the party is known for. With the end of the Syrian civil war and refugees returning home, the party might lose voters attracted to Özdağ’s narrative of “sending all refugees home immediately by Victory Tourism buses.”

In the 2023 elections and subsequent polls leading to 2026, the ZP has functioned more as a disruptor than a viable governing partner. Its aggressive stance often alienates the very conservative-nationalist base it hopes to win from the MHP and the AK Party. Though it captures a small, reactionary segment of the youth vote, its lack of a holistic platform makes it an unlikely contender for any serious power-sharing in the future. Still, the ZP is among the most willing to form alliances and most recently, called on the CHP to establish one with them for an “Ataturkist alliance.”

DEM Party

The DEM Party does not quite fit in the categories of relic or newcomer, but developments may render it the former. The latest incarnation of a left-wing ideology claiming to fight for the rights of the Kurdish community, the DEM Party holds considerable sway among the electorate, often trailing behind the CHP and occasionally overtaking the MHP in the opinion polls. Its spiritual predecessors have also enjoyed the same success in the elections.

The party’s electorate is strictly confined to Kurds, especially those concentrated in southeastern Türkiye. Despite securing roughly 8% in recent surveys, the party remains hamstrung by its inability to distance itself from the shadow of terrorism, which remains a red line for the majority of the electorate. Like its predecessors, the DEM Party has been a staunch supporter of the PKK terrorist group. A surprise initiative by the government to end the PKK terrorism outside of solely military means limited the DEM Party’s ambitions to thrive on pro-PKK propaganda to attract voters. In the past two years, the DEM Party has found itself in unexpected places: a messenger between PKK jailed ringleader Abdullah Öcalan and the general public, a guest at the Presidential Complex and in the offices of MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli, who publicly caught them off guard when he extended an olive branch to the party he once openly despised through well-known remarks in the past.

That the DEM Party and the CHP flirted with the idea of an alliance in the past elections and a so-called “urban compromise,” a not-so-hidden alliance for the DEM Party to support the CHP in big western cities where it has a slim chance of winning, is attributed to the main opposition’s growing success. Yet, with the terror-free Türkiye initiative launched by Bahçeli, the DEM Party has aligned more with the People’s Alliance, at least for the sake of the initiative. The DEM Party’s strict opposition and scathing rhetoric did not change much, though. The CHP or the DEM Party itself may try another shot at an alliance, hidden or obvious. But the CHP will have to risk losing voters who view the terror-free Türkiye initiative as a concession to the PKK.

A draft report by a Turkish parliamentary subcommittee says violence and bullying against children should be treated as a “national security” issue, calling for a broad set of measures in schools, families, the media and digital platforms.

The draft was prepared by a subcommittee under Parliament’s Petitions Committee after two women applied to the committee seeking action over bullying their children faced at school. The Subcommittee on Investigating Peer Bullying in Primary and Secondary Education Institutions and Determining Possible Measures was later established to examine the issue.

Chaired by ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) lawmaker Yıldız Konal Süslü, the panel completed a 308-page draft report made up of 10 main sections. The report was prepared after consultations with the ministries of education, health, justice, interior, and family and social services, as well as Türkiye’s Radio and Television Supreme Council, the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK), civil society groups and schools.

The report said efforts to combat peer bullying require a comprehensive approach covering educational, administrative and legal processes. It recommended clarifying the responsibilities of educational institutions, strengthening guidance and psychosocial support systems, involving parents more closely, expanding restorative justice practices and taking into account the role of media and digital platforms.

Promoting peer kindness

One of the report’s notable recommendations was the use of the term “peer kindness” instead of “peer bullying” in prevention work. The report said the language used in anti-bullying efforts has a significant effect on children and behavioral norms in schools.

It said using a more positive and supportive term could help encourage behavioral change and support communication based on empathy, respect and tolerance. The report recommended integrating the concept into guidance programs, school activities and awareness campaigns.

The report also emphasized the importance of improving physical conditions in schools to prevent bullying. It said overcrowded classrooms make it harder to supervise students and reduce teachers’ ability to monitor individual pupils and identify signs of bullying.

For that reason, the report recommended reducing class sizes to “reasonable and manageable” levels.

It also advised expanding restrictions on cellphone use in schools, in line with a circular issued by the Education Ministry, to help prevent cyberbullying and reduce distraction.

The report also said studies show that bullying behavior can increase the risk of involvement in crime and violence later in life. It recommended that police and gendarmerie units carry out educational activities in schools to inform children about the security consequences of violence and bullying, complaint mechanisms and the risks of involvement in crime.

The draft also included recommendations for parents. It proposed introducing a “Parent Academy” model in schools, saying training for parents should not remain limited to theoretical information but should include practical and participatory methods.

It stressed that fathers’ involvement in children’s social and emotional development is critical to preventing violence and bullying.

It also called for encouraging media organizations, digital content producers and platforms to create films, series, animations and social media content that offer positive role models, strengthen healthy peer relations and highlight empathy, inclusion and cooperation.

Moreover, the Education Ministry data also included in the report that 15,735 students received disciplinary penalties based on violence in the 2018-2019 school year. The figure was 287 in 2019-2020, 25,020 in 2020-2021, 14,766 in 2021-2022 and 20,039 in 2022-2023.

“Violence and bullying against children should be addressed as a national security issue,” the report said, adding that preventing violence, bullying and discriminatory behavior is essential not only for children’s individual well-being but also for building a healthy, productive and cohesive society.

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