Shanghai Cooperation Organization

I can't say I'm in the habit of reading Today's Zaman on a daily basis (indeed, I'm very unclear on what that means), but Brian Ulrich is right: "I've long wanted to read up on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, which I see an awful lot of in my current affairs reading. Fortunately, Mehmet Ogutcu has put together a good overview of the group and its implications."

Comments

I don't know Turkish, but for some reason I had it in my head that "zaman" is "today" in that language. It means "time" in Arabic and "era" in Farsi.

Posted by Brian Ulrich | August 23, 2007 10:09 AM

According to this translator, it can mean:

bout, cycle, date, day, father time, hour, season, tense, time, when, while, sands.

Posted by SoCalJustice | August 23, 2007 10:17 AM

"zaman" means "time" in the abstract sense (there's a different word, "waqt" for time in the concrete, "what time is it?" sense)

there are a lot of publications around the arab/muslim world called "zaman"--it's like having a time magazine here.

it looks like "today's zaman" is an english language translation of the turkish daily "zaman"

Posted by upyernoz | August 23, 2007 10:47 AM

I think the closing sentence re the Russian/Chinese/Kazakhstan Shanghai Cooperation
Organization was VERY interesting -- given that it's coming from Turkey in a medium set up for American readers:

"Given that the SCO is set to play a key future role in this region, Turkey will have to keep a watchful eye on its activities, particularly on how the proposed Energy Club will evolve, and the new security architecture taking shape in Eurasia in light of Ankara’s expanding energy, trade, investment and security ties with Russia, China and Central Asian countries."
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I'll repeat a point that I made at the end of the Armenian thread:

If we screw the Turks on Armenian Reparations, then they can switch to the Russians and say ""That's a nice oil pipeline you have running through our mountains. Too bad if something happened to it."

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan_pipeline

Seems to me that if we lose Turkey, we lose access to the Caspian Sea oil.

Posted by Don Williams | August 23, 2007 11:43 AM