Before the European Council's leaders' summit two months ago, experts and journalists in Turkey discussed the European Union's possible sanctions. The frozen EU agenda came into the Turkish public's focus with the sanctions threat. Both sides knew that sanctions were illogical and would not contribute to bilateral relations.

There will be a lot of questions about the state of global politics in 2020. The unpredictability and uncertainty of superpower behavior and instability of the international system generate a lot of question marks about the potential developments set to take shape in the coming year. Here are some of the issues and areas that we will continue to watch during 2020.

North Macedonia’s accession to the Alliance does not give promising signs of rapprochement between Russia and NATO

Nowadays it is hard to find a film analogy to describe U.S.-Russia relations. The rivalry of old days and the reset of the recent past are all over.

In this atmosphere the NYT continues with its oppositional stance to Turkey and radical anti-Erdoğan sentiment, despite its supposed liberal editorial line.

The Obama administration, knowing that the cease-fire would not last, started talking about Plan B in order to strong-arm Moscow into some kind of commitment.

2015 saw many incidents that are likely to continue in 2016, revealing the ineffectiveness of international and national security systems in preventing new threats like cyberattacks and showing countries that they need to update their security infrastructure to deal with 21st century threats.

The ups and downs in relations between the U.S. and Russia has resulted in the countries finding themselves on different sides of the conflicts in Syria and Ukraine, and in each of these crises Russia has continued to test the U.S.'s commitments.

Although the recent protests in Armenia may seem to be sparked by the announcement of a 20 percent price hike in public electricity, the main reason behind them is the economic and political dependence on Russia and the crisis in Ukraine.

Turkey is today in a very critical location due to multiple, evolving threats on its borders.

The popular claim that Turkey is moving away from NATO and its alliance with the West derives from the country's polarized political landscape and the opposition's anti-AK Party sentiments

The Syrian crisis has created a new cold war environment that calls on countries to take sides. This new environment has given rise to a state of "inaction" which has worked well for the Assad regime.

Despite the imminent danger that Central and Eastern European nations have felt since the beginning of the crisis in Ukraine, they do not look like they have been prepared for these moments and a potential crisis with Russia.

The domestic identity of the Russian people plays an important role in determining the role of Russia in the international system. Their dream for their future will play an important role in determining the future of Russian foreign policy.

During the course of the demonstrations in Kiev, the Central Asian regimes once again tried to avoid possible fallout from these demonstrations by censoring the news about the events.

The crisis in Ukraine is yet another serious test of U.S. leadership in terms of its international alliances, guarantees and assurances.

Western governments' indifference toward Russian advances in Syria and elsewhere helped boost Russia's self-confidence over the last three years