The Estonian Parliament has passed a new law aimed at severing ties between the Estonian Orthodox Church and the Moscow Patriarchate. The justification behind the law is the Moscow Patriarchate’s support for Russia’s military campaign against Ukraine. The bill, officially titled as a law for the “prevention of the instrumentalization of religious organizations to incite hatred or violence,” received 60 ...

By Yunus Soner, from Antalya / Türkiye US President Donald Trump’s tariff policies have caused wide reactions. In UWI’s previous interviews, made at the Antalya Diplomacy Forum, economics professor Jeffrey Sachs evaluated them as irrational, Chinese expert Professor Wang stated that his country would react, while Kenya’s Foreign Minister advocated for a joint African response. For Ghana’s Foreign Minister, they ...

By Mehmet Enes Beşer The resurgence of economic nationalism under the Donald Trump administration has reignited tensions in the trade relations between China and the US, casting a shadow on the stability of the global economy. Strategically located between these two economic behemoths, Southeast Asia is faced with a complex set of challenges and opportunities. The Association of Southeast Asian ...

By Fernando Esteche, from Buenos Aires / Argentina “Argentina has shown that this time it is different,” said Kristalina Georgieva, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), during the 2025 Spring Meetings of the IMF and the World Bank. What could have been read as a technical remark was in fact a political act: The explicit validation of an ...

Following the recent federal elections, the new German government and its cabinet of ministers is expected to be announced soon. Meanwhile, the country’s expected new chancellor Friedrich Merz has already pushed forward with a further militarization of the economy. Now, one of the expected ministers, Wolfram Weimer, responsible for culture and media, sparks debate in the country due to his ...

By Dr Halim Gençoğlu The Catholic Church stands at a critical crossroads. As it grapples with declining credibility in the West, growing spiritual hunger in the Global South, and internal calls for reform, questions surrounding its future leadership have taken on renewed urgency. For centuries, the papacy has been shaped largely by European traditions and perspectives, even as the heart ...

By Mehmet Enes Beşer The re-election of Donald Trump as the President of America in November 2024 has initiated a new cycle of economic nationalism, prompting every nation in the world to redesign its practice of trade. India, as a developing economy and with a checkered experience of dealing with America in the past, is at the crossroads. Trade relation ...

By Ali Rıza Taşdelen Tension between Algeria and France is escalating. The arrest of an Algerian consular official by the French security forces set off the latest flare-up. In response, Algeria expelled 12 French embassy employees on April 13. France retaliated by expelling twelve Algerian diplomatic and consular staff and recalled its ambassador to Algiers, Stéphane Romatet. Relations between the ...

By Adem Kılıç, Political Scientist In the global arena, there is an environment in which many standards – from human rights to nuclear conventions, from international legal norms to social conventions – are failing, increasing insecurity and shaking the foundations of the so-called “rules-based” world order. Historically speaking, the global order has been shaped by two major historical turning points, ...

By Mehmet Enes Beşer As a region ever more characterized by strategic realignment and multipolar competition, growing defense cooperation between the Philippines and Japan has garnered international attention—and no small degree of controversy. The February 2025 meeting between Philippine Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro and Japanese Defense Minister Gen Nakatani, which resulted in enhanced military-technical and surveillance cooperation, has been touted ...