Currently in Ghana, doing more research for the book and working at some magazine articles, mostly to do with food security and chieftaincy issues. Meanwhile, attending to final details on a Turkey feature I have upcoming in next issue of The Walrus.

The piece is based on research done last October and November, and then more follow up from afar. On the one hand I’m happy the article is coming out now, as the Western media has finally turned its attention to events in Turkey, although little of the coverage provides much context—a breach hopefully my article can fill. Things have been happening so fast & furious there of late, however, that developments I could only hint at in the article could be fait accompli by the time the article hits newsstands.

Legal proceedings to disband the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) are now underway, based on the dubious assertion that the party has been trying to institute sharia law by stealth. (The AKP took 47% of the popular vote in last year’s elections.) Meanwhile, a police investigation into a secular-nationalist “deep-state” network called Ergenekon has netted dozens of high profile suspects—including politicians, retired generals, journalists and university rectors. It is alleged that Ergenekon is responsible for several unsolved politically-motivated murders and plotting a coup for 2009.

Then Sunday, the day before the court began formally hearing the AKP case, two bombs exploded in the Güngören neighborhood of Istanbul, killing 17 and wounding more than a hundred. Istanbul’s governor has already suggested the PKK may be responsible, putting the Kurdish fighters firmly back at centre stage in the national soap opera, alongside the AKP (aka the Islamists) and the Kemalists (aka the secular-nationalists).

I find it very hard to fathom, however, that the PKK is behind the bombing. At this moment in time, with the court action and Ergenekon investigation, it doesn’t make any sense. There’s absolutely nothing for the PKK to gain from it, although the most common theory being reported is that the bombings were in reply to another air raid by Turkish forces on PKK positions in northern Iraq. Even if the motive was to further destabilize the Turkish state—the PKK need not have bothered as the bitter struggle between the AKP and the Kemalists was achieving that well enough on it’s own.

I’ve never felt so vulnerable to entertaining wild, crack-pot conspiracy theories as I have since wading into the murk of Turkish politics. Sure, the PKK could be responsible (although they’ve denied it so far, and typically they take credit for these kinds of things). But I find it equally plausible that some rogue faction of the secular-nationalists engineered this as a kind of black ops to push the nation ever further toward crisis, thus putting the military command back in the driver’s seat. Yes, it sounds whack. But it wouldn’t be the first time individuals connected to the security forces have killed Turkish civilians, making it look like the Kurds did it.

And here I’ll inch further along my lonely branch of this wingnut tree: the bombings could mark the return of Kurdish Hezbollah (no relation to the Lebanese version). The Islamist militants, enemies of the Marxist-inclined PKK, have been in the past proven useful to the Turkish military, as both a fellow combatant against the Kurdish separatists, and a convenient instrument for further muddying the country’s sectarian waters. After secretly upplying arms to Hezbollah in the early 1990s, the government cracked down on the militants in 1998 when they expanded their targets beyond the PKK. In 2001, Hezbollah assassinated the police chief of Diyarbakir; two years later, the organization claimed responsibility for bombings at two Istanbul synagogues.

The official line is that the organization is inactive. With a little help, however, it could surely mobilize again, especially given some incentive. Such as the government’s success brokering talks between Israel and Syria, and more recently the U.S. and Iran. Despite being an Islam-inspired political party, the AKP in government is perhaps not Islamic enough for Hezbollah’s liking.

The point in the end is to ask who has motive and who stands to benefit from the bombings. My gut says a renewed Kurdish Hezbollah assisted by elements of the military.

In parting, here are two Turkey-related stories that should be taken as further signs of the times. First, evidence that you can’t criticize the Turkish military for anything—even if you’re a superstar transsexual pop singer. And second, as though to illustrate one of the observations in my Walrus article, that Atatürk’s remains the last personality cult of the 20th century to still play a defining role in his nation’s affairs, there’s something strange happening in a town called Damal.