For several years, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been edging toward the cauterized form of democracy that Russian President Vladimir Putin has made his own. The two men like each other. Erdogan respects Putin's toughness, certainly more than he does the European Union, forever whining about civil liberties.
Earlier this year, Erdogan raised the issue of joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organization -- a security group consisting of China, Russia and several ex-Soviet Asian nations -- and later signed Turkey up as a "dialog partner." On Jan. 25, he said, only half in jest, that he told Putin: "Include us in the Shanghai Five and we will forget about the EU.” He said he thought the Shanghai group was the better and stronger bloc.
The two men share other traits. Both are macho former sportsmen -- Putin in Judo, Erdogan in soccer. Both have been genuinely popular for most of their time in power. Both benefited from the gratitude of voters who have seen the economy around them stabilize and recover from a period of crisis -- in Russia that was the wild 1990s and the default of 1998, in Turkey it was a 2001 financial crisis. Both are seeing that economic success begin to fade.
Read more: s Erdogan's Turkey the Next Putin's Russia? - Bloomberg
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