The first announcement of the COVID-19 virus as a global pandemic led to different and unforeseen experiences in life. At first, everyone perceived it differently: some did not take it seriously, while others became paranoid or hygiene-obsessed, cleaning constantly and washing almost everything brought from the market. There was no global action plan against a worldwide pandemic. Authorities introduced new regulations, different for every country, depending on the severity of cases. Italy, Spain, and France entered strict lockdowns. In Türkiye, a trial to agree on proper regulations was, and apparently, still is underway. Within a short period of time, face masks, hygiene, and social and physical distancing became the standard almost everywhere in the world. Some countries emerged as models, while others managed the situation surprisingly poorly, causing higher death rates due to incompetent intervention. . . More

In the 20th century, the focus of Turkey’s foreign policy orientation was the Western world, and non-Western regions such as Asia did not occupy an important place in Turkey’s foreign policy agenda. By the 21st century, Turkey, under the Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi, AK Party), has adopted a multidimensional foreign policy approach aiming to establish strong relations with all actors in the international area. However, in the first two periods of the AK Party government, Turkey’s foreign policy orientation has generally been towards the Middle East region. In the post-2011 period, due to the problems in relations with its allies and regional actors, Turkey has wanted to diversify its foreign policy and regions such as Asia have gained more importance for Turkey. In 2013, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan brought up the issue that Turkey could become a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization due to the problems in relations with the EU (Erşen, 2013: 15). During this period, Turkey’s commercial relations with Asian countries gained dynamism and the Free Trade Agreement signed with Malaysia on 17 April 2014 entered into force on 1 August 2015 (Republic of Turkey Ministry of Trade, 2022a)... More