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Gareth Jenkins Says Turkey Needs to Forge Relationships (Audio) · Bloomberg Intelligence

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  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Business Flash you're listening to Taking Stock with Kathleen
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  Speaker 1: Bloomberg Radio. We turn now to Turkey, to Istanbul, in particular,
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  Speaker 1: uh Turkey deploying anti terrorism squads at Istanbul's main international
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  Speaker 1: airport after three suspected Islama State suicide bombers killed forty
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  Speaker 1: one people this week, and this underscores, among other things,
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  Speaker 1: the country struggle to contain a spill over from serious
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  Speaker 1: civil war. If you're watching all the news flow on
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  Speaker 1: your Bloomberg today, you're seeing stories of how houses hit
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  Speaker 1: Turkey's tourism U industry. You're seeing a story about the
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  Speaker 1: lyri rizing with other emerging markets because there's a bet
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  Speaker 1: now that they'll be stimulus to offset the damage. What
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  Speaker 1: does this mean for the country, for its president and
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  Speaker 1: its economy going forward? Very happy to welcome to the
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  Speaker 1: show now Gareth Jenkins, political security analyst who is joining
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  Speaker 1: us from Istanbul, Gareth, welcome to the show. Thank you
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  Speaker 1: very much for having me. I had to start by
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  Speaker 1: asking you about the mood in Istanbul today. It's very depressed.
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  Speaker 1: I mean there were lots of concerns previously. We've already
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  Speaker 1: had two attacks of course, earlier this year from miss
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  Speaker 1: another one from the p k K. And I think
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  Speaker 1: the scale of what happened last night has really hits
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  Speaker 1: very hard. Well, it's uh, I mean hit. I think
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  Speaker 1: when I saw the headlines crossing, I think all of
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  Speaker 1: us our heart goes out. You feel it. It could
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  Speaker 1: have been an airport anywhere. It feels like it's could
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  Speaker 1: have been one of your loved ones. In Turkey in particular, though,
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  Speaker 1: where there's so many cross currents, uh, so many dynamics politically,
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  Speaker 1: What what do people leak to do? Who do they blame?
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  Speaker 1: What do what? I think it's a certain extence. We've
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  Speaker 1: had so many of these it's been very difficult to
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  Speaker 1: single at anybody to blame. And this attack is unusual
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  Speaker 1: in that previously mostly attacks be cool, they've been against
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  Speaker 1: foreigners by ISIS. In in Istanbul we've had attacked by
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  Speaker 1: the p k K that have been primarily directed as
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  Speaker 1: the security forces. But this just seemed to be at people,
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  Speaker 1: and I think that really is one of the reasons
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  Speaker 1: it's has had such an impact. And of course there
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  Speaker 1: is um there's anger with the government. Government gets gets
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  Speaker 1: blamed because ultimately it's supposed to be responsible for security.
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  Speaker 1: And we've also had some people questioning the security at
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  Speaker 1: the airport itself. Um. But to a large extent, I
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  Speaker 1: think the mood is is still very much one of shock.
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  Speaker 1: The blame game really hasn't quite started yet that maybe
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  Speaker 1: we may see that over the next few days. Well,
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  Speaker 1: you know, you're a piece that would recommend everybody to
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  Speaker 1: find online. Is one that you public just five days
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  Speaker 1: ago June four. Currently no indication as to when President
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  Speaker 1: Erdowa will leave power, but Turkey is now deep into
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  Speaker 1: the final and highly turbulent stage of his domination of
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  Speaker 1: the country's politics. Uh. Sometimes you think that people turn
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  Speaker 1: to a strong man when they're under attack. Does instead
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  Speaker 1: they'll yet another attack? We can has hold on power,
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  Speaker 1: which you argue he's doing everything he can to maintain. Yes,
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  Speaker 1: I think it does. I mean one of the one
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  Speaker 1: of the big problems at the moments. Of course, we
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  Speaker 1: have two security sets. We have what one from the
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  Speaker 1: p k K, and we also have one from ISIS.
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  Speaker 1: And I think most people outside ed On was in
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  Speaker 1: the circle though that they whatever when they think of
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  Speaker 1: the p k K. There there is a way forward there,
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  Speaker 1: and that's the return to talks, which would also not
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  Speaker 1: only probably persuade the p k K to an answer
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  Speaker 1: sea file, but would free up a lot of the
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  Speaker 1: resources as are needed in terms of intelligence um to
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  Speaker 1: focus more on isis which is a you cannot talk
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  Speaker 1: with isis M. You can talk with the p k
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  Speaker 1: K and reduce the violence. But ed One's put himself
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  Speaker 1: in a position where he found there can be no
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  Speaker 1: returned the talks um where he's trying to change the
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  Speaker 1: constitution to get a presidential system which concentrates all power
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  Speaker 1: in his own hands, to demonstrate he can deliver solutions um,
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  Speaker 1: and he's avowed to crush the p k K. It's
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  Speaker 1: very difficult for him. It's now to step back and
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  Speaker 1: return to to talk without losing a lot of credibility
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  Speaker 1: amongst his hardcore supporters. Of course, of UH. The p
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  Speaker 1: k K UH is the Kurdistan Workers Party. That's the
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  Speaker 1: Kurdish acronym for it. For those that maybe who are
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  Speaker 1: not following all of this quite so closely. So what
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  Speaker 1: so the next as Ardawan reaches for power, then internally
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  Speaker 1: and in terms of the various factions that are in Turkey,
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  Speaker 1: who is supporting him, who may be opposed in him,
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  Speaker 1: could we see some kind of I don't know, in
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  Speaker 1: election and uprising something that that moves against him in
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  Speaker 1: a very dramatic way. We've seen a very unfortunate erosion
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  Speaker 1: of faith in the rule of law, and we're seeing
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  Speaker 1: a couple of measures at the moments preparing to go
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  Speaker 1: through Parliament that will tighten adman control of the judiciary.
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  Speaker 1: We've just had a motion gone through Parliament that's lifted
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  Speaker 1: the immunities of all of the current members of the
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  Speaker 1: Parliament of five hundred and fifty deputies. Um. But we're
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  Speaker 1: expecting there to be core cases against the opposition, both
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  Speaker 1: the mainstreaming opposition of the Republican People's Party and also
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  Speaker 1: the pro Kurdish People's Democratic Party. And I think this
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  Speaker 1: call if these people are these opposition politicians that behind
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  Speaker 1: bars and we could get a quite a lot of protests.
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  Speaker 1: It's tempting to see the ruling system development part he
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  Speaker 1: has being wholly united behind head on. They're certainly frightened
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  Speaker 1: of him, but there are people within the party who
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  Speaker 1: are very concerned about that. They're actually he's taking Turkey.
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  Speaker 1: And the hope is that at some time they stand
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  Speaker 1: up and and try to hold this seemingly accelerating slide
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  Speaker 1: into authoritarianism. But quite what that trigger would be to
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  Speaker 1: persuade um them to come out, we still don't know
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  Speaker 1: now ether one President ear One has reached out. Just
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  Speaker 1: this week, he's ending a six year rift with Israel.
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  Speaker 1: He's unexpectedly moving to mentories with Russia. What is his
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  Speaker 1: motivation there? Does he perceive himself as weakened by some
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  Speaker 1: of these events? Do does he see this as part
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  Speaker 1: of him increasing his hold on power to take a
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  Speaker 1: move with countries In the past he's been very much
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  Speaker 1: opposed to absolutely and with with the Israeli agreement, is
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  Speaker 1: he's actually gone back on what he said was this
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  Speaker 1: core demand, which was to remove the blockade the Gaza.
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  Speaker 1: I don't think the agreement with themselves has been negotiated
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  Speaker 1: for more than three years. It's not going to have
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  Speaker 1: a big impact. What could have an impact is uh
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  Speaker 1: the meeting, what the telephone call they had today, with
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  Speaker 1: Vladimer prutin Um, particularly if that leads to um, you know,
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  Speaker 1: an improvement in the economic relationship, because Russians were the
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  Speaker 1: second largest source of tourism the Turkey UM since of
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  Speaker 1: Putin effectively prevented Russians coming, we've had a nine percent
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  Speaker 1: decrease in the Russian tourists coming to the country. And
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  Speaker 1: of course tourism has been very badly hit by the
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  Speaker 1: by security concern so that may have an impact, But
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  Speaker 1: I think generally the reason he's moved now is because
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  Speaker 1: he's understood that Turkey is very dangerously isolated internationally and
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  Speaker 1: he needs to improve relations with with somebody, and with
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  Speaker 1: Russian particularly. There's the opportunity to do something which could
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  Speaker 1: give a boost to the tourism sector, which is huge.
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  Speaker 1: It's a single largest source of Palm currency for Turkey
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  Speaker 1: and numbers so far down down. The expectation is that
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  Speaker 1: things go on once we get into the peak season,
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  Speaker 1: they're going down even even further and a lot of hotels, etcetera.
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  Speaker 1: Could could go into liquidation. So there was big economic
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  Speaker 1: benefits for him. M you know, that's Pluton, and in
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  Speaker 1: the way of a terrorist attack, people might find a
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  Speaker 1: little bit trivial to talk about the tourism industry, but
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  Speaker 1: as you point out, this is so important to Turkey.
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  Speaker 1: Turkey also a very important destination for emerging market investors
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  Speaker 1: more broadly, Uh, is that another threat to Arnawan that
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  Speaker 1: the economy is not doing as well as it once was.
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  Speaker 1: How much is all of this affecting the growth of
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  Speaker 1: this very important destination for investors. Yes, I think it is.
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  Speaker 1: I mean it's one of the the I think the
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  Speaker 1: largely ignored factors behind the grip that he's been. He's
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  Speaker 1: managed to put on on Turkish politics as a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people voted for him and voted for the ruling
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  Speaker 1: Justice and Development Party because of its economic record, But
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  Speaker 1: he doesn't seem to understand that he's now undermining it's
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  Speaker 1: for one of the things investors care most about. I
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  Speaker 1: think they don't care how much unfortunately about democracy and
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  Speaker 1: rule of law, but they do care very much about
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  Speaker 1: stability um and they need to see at the moment
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  Speaker 1: that their investments are going to be to be secure
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  Speaker 1: if they put money into the country. Gareth quick final
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  Speaker 1: question ten seconds, will will air to one hold under
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  Speaker 1: power in a year? In two years and five years?
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  Speaker 1: My predictions has been until two thousand, two thousand nineteen
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  Speaker 1: will be gone. Thank you so very much. Fascinating discussion
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  Speaker 1: of Turkey, where the country is heading and where President
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  Speaker 1: are to On is heading as well. Gareth Jenkins, thank
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  Speaker 1: you so much. Writer, independent political security analysts and a
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  Speaker 1: senior fellow with the Central Asia CAUCUSUS Institute and Silk
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  Speaker 1: Road Studies Program Joint Center. Joining us today from Istanbul.
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  Speaker 1: I'm Kathleen Hayes. This is taking Stock on Bloomberg Radio.