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On the prospects of Erdogan’s presidency for Turkey and for the South Caucasus region Panorama.am has spoken to Dr. Bayram Balci – visiting scholar in Carnegie’s Middle East Program and founding member of the European Journal of Turkish Studies. Dr. Balci believes that there is a risk for Turkey to become more authoritarian but that Turkey is going to be interested in normalization of relations with Armenia. He also considers the membership of Turkey or Azerbaijan in the Eurasian Union highly unlikely.

- Dr. Balci, now that Erdogan has become the President of Turkey there are legitimate fears that Turkey will increasingly become more authoritarian, especially given Erdogan’s stated intentions to amend the Constitution to make Turkey a presidential state. What can be the implication of a more authoritarian and perhaps more powerful Turkey under Erdogan’s rule for the South Caucasus region and for Armenia in particular? Are the Turkish policies in this regard likely to change in any way?

- First of all, indeed there is a risk that the new Turkey with Erdogan becomes more authoritarian, because of the personality and the charisma of the new President, and because he wants to change the Constitution. But at the same time I am not sure that he will be able to continue to run with such an arrogant way for at least two reasons. The first one is that in fact his victory was a small victory and not huge and impressive as it was predicted by many analysts. Some analysts had talk about 57% of vote for him in the first round. The second reason is that he knows that usually the President in turkey is a sort of father of the nation and I think he will try to embrace this now more paternalist function. Moreover he knows that he has now a real opposition, since the Gezi Park and he cannot continue to defy them eternally.

As for the South Caucasus and for Armenia, at this moment the South Caucasus is maybe the only region where Turkish foreign policy is not completely in a failure situation. And I think that this is a very important issue that Erdogan will try to maintain. In the Middle East Turkey’s relations are good only with the Hamas, the KRG and Iran. With Egypt, Iraq of Bagdad, Syria, Saudi Arabia these relations are tense. I think because of this at least in the South Caucasus Turkey will do its best to have good relations with Georgia, Azerbaijan and will try to improve the relations with Armenia. Since the condolences presented by Erdogan to the descendants of the victims of the genocide, a term he did not use but this is however a turning point in the relations between Armenia and Turkey. It will be difficult to have at the same time excellent relations with Azerbaijan and normalization with Armenia but I think that the new President in Turkey will do his best to improve Turkish Armenian relations without antagonizing Azerbaijan.

- In your article “Strengths and Constraints of Turkish Policy in the South Caucasus” you speak about Turkey’s and Azerbaijan’s brotherhood and long-standing goals to “recreate a solidarity based on Turkishness, connecting all Turkish speaking nations”. We also know that historically Armenia has always been standing in the way of these plans because of her geographical location. In this context is Turkish current policy towards Armenia really “hostage” to Azerbaijan or is Turkey pursuing its own strategic goals by suffocating Armenia economically and by other means?  

- I don’t think that Turkey approves and believes that the strategy of suffocation Armenia economically is the good one. Turkish leaders are certain since the beginning that this strategy is not the good one but the solidarity with Azerbaijan is inevitable because of the strong support of Turkish public opinion to Azerbaijan, and also, and most importantly, because of the important of energy issues for Turkey. Turkey would like to open the border and improve its relations with Armenia but because of these two topics it is not easy at all.

- What implications can there be for Armenia if Russia and Turkey go on deepening their cooperation in economic and other spheres? Do you see any possibility for Turkey or Azerbaijan to join the Russia-led Customs Union in future?

- I don’t think that good relations between Turkey and Russia can have negative impacts on Turkish- Armenian relations. As for the Turkey’s and Azerbaijan’s possible adhesion to the Eurasian Custom Union I absolutely don’t believe that this is a serious scenario. I think Turkey is still more European than inclined to be member of this Eurasian Union and in Turkey elites and population are not ready at all to engage Turkey in such a direction. As for Azerbaijan and its future possible adhesion to this Union, I think not only Azerbaijan but a lot of post-soviet Republics in Central Asia and the Caucasus are reluctant to join this Union. Since the invasion of Crimea by Russian forces Putin has lost all of the little trust he had among Central Asian and Caucasian leaders. Azerbaijan is very western turned country and aspires to deepen its relation with the West. I don’t believe at all that it can be tempted to join an organization managed by Putin who aspires to reestablish (at least he is perceived like this) a new Russian hegemonic domination in the former Soviet Union.