National Role in Turkish Foreign Policy

Turkey’s foreign policy has been in a state of change since the AKP (Justice and Development Party) government came into power in 2002. Regarding the internal and external factors, this article argues that the changes in identification national role have been one the factors that led Turkey to conduct a new pro-active foreign policy. Turkey has perceived duties and/or responsibilities for itself in its relations with other states in the regions to which Turkey feels deep-rooted historical, cultural and religious ties. The outcomes of this change have been observable in the relations between Turkey and the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) in the north of Iraq, which evolved from conflictual to cooperative relations since 2008.