ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey launched a heavy air and artillery assault on Kurdish guerrilla targets in northern Iraq overnight after a declaration by Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan that he had lost patience with separatists fighting in south-east Turkey.

Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) separatists use the mountains of northern Iraq as sanctuary from which to launch attacks in south-east Turkey. The raids, the first by Turkey in the area since July 2010, responded to a surge in rebel action in recent months and an ambush on Wednesday that killed nine servicemen.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey launched a heavy air and artillery assault on Kurdish guerrilla targets in northern Iraq overnight following a declaration by Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan that he had lost patience with separatists fighting in south-east Turkey.

Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) separatists use the mountains of Northern Iraq as sanctuary from which to launch attacks in south-east Turkey. The raids, the first by Turkey in the area, since July 2010, responded to a surge in rebel action in recent months and an ambush on Wednesday that killed nine servicemen.

ISTANBUL, Aug 11 (Reuters) – Turkish markets fell on
Thursday in response to European debt concerns, which outweighed
the positive impact of central bank comments pointing towards a
narrowing of the current account deficit.

The yield on the benchmark May 15, 2013 bond
<0#TRTSYSUM=IS>, which dipped below 8 percent during the
morning, rose back to 8.15 percent by 1145 GMT. It closed at
8.08 percent on Wednesday.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has an unspoken pact with the Turkish electorate: he delivers rapid economic growth, jobs and money, and voters let him shape what kind of democracy this Muslim nation of 74 million people becomes.

So far, the deal has served him well.

Erdogan has overseen a near tripling of per capita income in the last decade. That has helped blunt misgivings over the way he deals with dissent, and allowed him to subordinate Turkey’s powerful military, which has long seen itself as guardian of the country’s secular soul. Last year he used a plebiscite on constitutional reform to break the cliques in the judiciary, another bastion of Turkey’s secular old guard.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has an unspoken pact with the Turkish electorate: he delivers rapid economic growth, jobs and money, and voters let him shape what kind of democracy this Muslim nation of 74 million people becomes.

So far, the deal has served him well.

Erdogan has overseen a near tripling of per capita income in the last decade. That has helped blunt misgivings over the way he deals with dissent, and allowed him to subordinate Turkey’s powerful military, which has long seen itself as guardian of the country’s secular soul. Last year he used a plebiscite on constitutional reform to break the cliques in the judiciary, another bastion of Turkey’s secular old guard.

ISTANBUL, Aug 3 (Reuters) – Turkey’s central bank will hold
an emergency meeting on Thursday, expected to jack up overnight
borrowing rates in a bid to bolster a weak lira amid growing
concerns that its economy is overheating.

The bank’s announcement of an interim meeting before its
next scheduled sitting came as Moody’s rating agency warned
overdependence on “volatile” sources of foreign capital to
finance a large current account deficit left it exposed to the
euro zone’s worsening debt crisis.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – When the head of Turkey’s military quit in protest along with the commanders of the army, navy and air force, it left one man standing in Turkey’s high command – General Necdet Ozel.

The 61-year-old head of the paramilitary Gendarmerie was promptly called to meet Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and President Abdullah Gul on Friday and told he would be acting chief of the armed forces.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey’s military and political leaders face a battle to restore order in NATO’s second-biggest army Monday at a military council overshadowed by the resignation of its top four generals in protest at the jailing of hundreds of officers.

The long-running strains between the secularist military and Islamist-rooted government boiled over Friday when Chief of General Staff Isik Kosaner stepped down, along with the army, navy and air force commanders, leaving the armed forces in disarray.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan vowed on Saturday to press ahead with plans for a new constitution which he said would boost democracy, but he made no mention of the country’s top military commanders quitting in what was a pre-recorded speech.

The armed forces commander General Isik Kosaner stepped down on Friday evening along with the army, navy and air force chiefs in protest at the jailing of 250 officers on charges of conspiring against Erdogan’s government.

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – The resignations of Turkey’s top four military commanders will enable the ruling AK Party to consolidate its power over the armed forces, reinforcing its gains in a decade-long struggle to exert control over the once-omnipotent military.

The cost of that victory will be heightened polarization in Turkey between the government, which has roots in political Islam, and its staunchly secularist opponents. Such a prospect may further unsettle already fragile financial markets.