In some quarters, Mr Erdogan’s 12-year stint in office, during which per capita income has nearly tripled and the country has been re-established as a regional power, has been hailed as a model of what a progressive Muslim government can achieve. It is for this reason that both Washington and London have urged the EU to reconsider its obstructive handling of Turkey’s bid for full membership.
But against Mr Erdogan’s impressive economic track record must be set his increasingly authoritarian style of government, with politicians and journalists regularly being jailed for criticising his policies, and his desire to build alliances with radical Islamic governments. Before the recent wave of Arab uprisings hit the Middle East, Mr Erdogan’s main focus was to develop better relations with the ayatollahs in Tehran.
He was forced to abandon this policy only after it became clear that he could no longer tolerate the survival of the Assad regime, which just so happens to be Iran’s most important regional ally. To compensate, Mr Erdogan has made a point of befriending Mohammed Morsi, the Egyptian president, whose Muslim Brotherhood recently emerged as the victors of Egypt’s bout of unrest.
Like Mr Morsi, the Turkish leader would be happy to see the Muslim Brotherhood in Syria emerge as the eventual victors of the crisis in that country, a development which would lead to the establishment of a network of Islamist governments – a “Sunni arc” from the shores of North Africa to those of the eastern Mediterranean.
