NYT: "In foreign policy shift, Erdogan's victory speech reached out to peoples of Turkey's troubled region"

With his victory speech after Sunday's elections, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan outlined a shift in Turkish foreign policy approach that could have wide-ranging consequences in a turbulent region, according to analysts interviewed by The New York Times for an article published on Wednesday. By saying, "Today, the Middle East, the Caucasus and the Balkans have won as much as Turkey … I greet with affection the peoples of Baghdad, Damascus, Beirut, Amman, Cairo, Tunis, Sarajevo, Skopje, Baku, Nicosia and all other friends and brother peoples who are following the news out of Turkey with great excitement," Erdogan specifically addressed himself to the regions of Turkey's historical sphere of influence, argued the Times. "Caught off-guard by the popular uprisings of the Arab Spring, Ankara is ditching a policy that prized stability above all else [and] rested almost exclusively on contacts with regional governments," wrote reporter Susanne Gusten. "In the new era, Mr. Erdogan will bypass governments in the region if necessary and reach out to their citizens with support for democratic and economic reforms, government officials and foreign policy experts say. While the approach is new, Ankara's strategic goal remains to bolster a region that can prosper and also offer opportunities for Turkey's growing economy."