Pinar Tremblay, al-monitor.com, January 29, 2019
image from article, with caption:Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu leave an Armistice Day ceremony marking 100 years since the end of World War I, Paris, Nov. 11, 2018.
ARTICLE SUMMARY
Career diplomats and Foreign Ministry bureaucrats have been shoved aside and demoralized by the conduct of Turkey's foreign policy under Justice and Development Party governments
After two decades, Turkey’s diplomats are used to becoming targets of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s disdain. Often accused of being unpatriotic or faint-hearted, the country’s diplomatic elite has seen their power – not to mention their prestige – diminish under the acid-tongue president and his cronies.
The last punch came on Jan. 14 at an off-the-record parliamentarian event, where Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu declared that politically-appointed diplomats –something the Foreign Ministry grudgingly accepted after lo..