Page 15 - TURKRptAug20
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French President Emmanuel Macron accused Turkey of massively importing jihadists into Libya in a “criminal” intervention by “a country which claims to be a Nato member”. Macron demanded EU sanctions are imposed against Turkey for “violations” of Greek and Cypriot waters.
Turkey paused its hydrocarbon exploration operations in the eastern Mediterranean for a period pending talks with Greece.
Armenian PM said the border clash situation with Azerbaijan stabilised. Azerbaijan held military exercises with Turkish forces.
The Turkish competition board has launched an investigation into German carmakers Audi, Porsche, Volkswagen, Mercedes-Benz and BMW.
On July 1, German carmaker Volkswagen said the blow to demand caused by the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis meant a proposal for it to build a $1.4bn auto plant in Turkey – already in doubt given union protests against investing in a country responsible for human rights offences during its incursion into north-east Syria last October – was no longer under consideration.
Erdogan turned Hagia Sophia to a mosque. He could not manage to attract desired attention neither at home nor abroad. Greece on July 21 accused Turkey of attempting to encroach on its continental shelf. Netflix has withdrawn a drama series after the Turkish government denied it a filming licence over a gay character, the streaming service said on July 21.
The AKP party presented a bill to parliament that if passed will block social media sites including Twitter, YouTube and Facebook if they refuse to comply with stringent new conditions.
Turkey is now a “moderate autocracy” rather than a “hybrid regime”—which exhibits a mixture of characteristics of democracy and autocracy—according to the latest version of the University of Wurzburg’s Democracy Matrix (DeMaX).
The country ranked 138th out of 176 countries in the matrix’s total value index for 2019. That put it below countries including Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Haiti.
Erdogan’s goal to end Turkish dependency on foreign suppliers to build weapons is ‘in no way realistic’.
3.0 Macro Economy
Main Macro Indicators
2015
2016
2017
2018
Q1
Q2
Q3
Q4
2019
Q1
Q2
Q3
GDP Growth (y/y)
6.1
3.2
7.5
2.8
-2.3
-1.6
1.0
6.0
0.9
4.5
-
-
GDP (per capita, $)
10,915
10,817
10,537
9,346
-
-
-
-
9,127
-
-
-
GDP (current, TRYbn)
2,339
2,609
3,111
3,724
922
1,023
1,146
1,190
4,280
1,071
-
-
GDP (current prices, $bn)
859
863
852
766
172
174
202
206
754
176
-
-
CPI (%, eop)
8.8
8.5
11.9
20.3
19.7
15.7
9.3
11.8
11.8
11.9
12.6
-
Lira-loans (%, y/y, Jul 24)
14.4
12.3
24.9
1.8
3.0
-0.5
4.0
13.9
13.9
19.1
40.9
44.1
Policy Rate (%, eop, active)
8.8
8.3
12.8
24.1
25.5
23.9
16.3
11.4
11.4
9.3
7.6
7.8
Population (mn)
78.7
79.8
80.8
82.0
-
-
-
-
83.2
-
-
-
Unemployment (%, eop, Apr)
10.3
10.9
10.9
11.0
14.1
13.0
13.8
13.7
13.7
13.2
12.8
-
CA Balance ($bn, May)
-32.4
-31.5
-46.6
-28.3
-1.88
-1.29
5.92
-1.07
1.67
-7.87
-8.85
-
CA Balance/GDP (%)
-3.8
-3.6
-5.5
-3.7
-1.1
-0.7
2.9
-0.5
0.2
-4.5
-
-
15 TURKEY Country Report August 2020 www.intellinews.com