It's been an eventful week for Turkey. On Sunday, 17 people were killed in bomb attacks in Istanbul and on Wednesday the Constitutional Court narrowly decided not to ban the governing AK party - which has been accused of being an Islamist party in violation of Turkey's secular constitution. 

 The World Tonight has given prominence to Turkey this week. We sent our reporter, Paul Moss, to cover the court decision - though in the event he landed a couple of hours after Sunday's bomb attacks and was on hand to report on that story for BBC Radio 5 Live and the Today programme as well The World Tonight.

Having our own reporter there enabled us to get access to interviews with Turkish politicians and people which we wouldn't normally get.
I have been asked why I decided to invest in this story by sending a reporter and devoting so much airtime to it.
The answer is simple - and I hope this came out in our coverage. Turkey is central to two major issues facing the world today - the relationship between Islam and democracy and the future development of the European Union, which Turkey wants to join.
 The country is a majority Muslim country that is also a democracy at a time when other Muslim countries in the region are not democratic in the sense that they have competitive elections that lead to a change of government. (There are Asian countries, like Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Iran that have a history of various models of electoral politics punctuated by military and authoritarian rule). 

The Turkish republic was founded by an army officer, Mustafa Kamal Ataturk, as the Ottoman Empire collapsed after the First World War. He established a secular state where before the Ottoman Empire had been an Islamic state in the sense that it claimed to be the successor of the original Caliphate.
He and his successor ruled the country until the first democratic election in 1950, but periods of democratic rule have been punctuated since by coups by the army which regards itself as the guardian of the secular state founded by Ataturk. 

The country has been governed by the AK (Justice and Development) Party for the past six years which was returned to power last year with a big majority. AK describes itself as a moderate conservative pro-Western party, its critics say it is a closet Islamist party trying to introduce an Islamic state by stealth.
So you have a tension between a democratic system that returns a government that many in the secularist establishment of the country regard as unconstitutional. What happens in Turkey will have an impact on the evolution of democracy in Muslim states. Our presenter, Robin Lustig, has also blogged on this.

Turkey also wants to join the EU - something opposed by many politicians in France and Germany but supported by governments such as the UK. A large Muslim country much of which is situated in Asia, rather than Europe, would inevitably change the nature of the EU.
The AK party is a strong supporter of EU membership so its future is important to that ambition - even if this ambition is now in jeopardy by apparent enlargement fatigue in the EU.
I believe Turkey is worth the coverage, but let me know if you agree. 

單字
accused 被告
ambition 有...野心;追求
apparent 表面的,外觀的;未必真實的
authoritarian 權力主義者;獨裁主義者
ban 禁止;禁令[C][(+on/against)]
caliphate 回教國王的地位
closet  私下的,祕密的
collapse 使倒塌;使崩潰
competitive 競爭的;經由競爭的,競爭性的
conservative 保守的,守舊的
constitution  保守的,守舊的
constitutional 體質上的;生來的;本質的;基本的
court 體質上的;生來的;本質的;基本的
critic 批評家,評論家
democracy 民主;民主主義
describe 描寫,描繪,敘述
devote 將...奉獻(給)[(+to)]
enlargement 擴大;擴展
evolution 發展,進展
fatigue 疲勞,勞累
govern 統治;管理
guardian 保護者,守護者;管理員
inevitably 不可避免地;必然地
jeopardy 危險,風險,危難
majority  多數,過半數,大多數
moderate 中等的,適度的
narrowly 狹窄地
politician 從事政治者,政治家
punctuate 在...中間加標點
secular 現世的;世俗的;非宗教的
situated 位於...的,坐落在...的
stealth 祕密行動;鬼鬼祟祟
unconstitutional 違反憲法的
various 不同的;各種各樣的,形形色色的
violation 違反;違背;違犯


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