What do we know about the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK)?

Since the summer of 2015, Turkey has been the victim of a wave of violent attacks perpetrated by both Islamists and separatist Kurdish groups. The beginning of this period of violence coincided with the collapse of the peace process between Ankara and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and the resumption of their 30-year-old conflict. Within this context of violence and creeping civil war, another Kurdish faction, the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (TAK), has made its comeback. The TAK claimed responsibility for a series of major attacks against Turkish civilians and security forces throughout 2016, attracting the attention of the media and generating a great deal of confusion on the nature of its relationship with the PKK. International media outlets have been so far unable to distinguish between the two groups, which reinforces Ankara’s position that the TAK is a mere extension of the PKK

The 2017 independence referendum and the political economy of Kurdish nationalism in Iraq

In September 2017, the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq held a referendum for independence despite the high likelihood of heavy retaliation. In contrast to the narrative that presents that decision as the result of gross miscalculation, this article offers an alternative explanation highlighting the role played by Kurdish nationalism in upholding the structures of power of the region. The current class structure, institutional framework and rentier economy of Iraqi Kurdistan had their origins in the 1990s when Kurdish forces gained permanent control of the region. The new ruling class that developed in that decade had a profoundly extractive character and based its power on a strategy of appropriation of the public resources pursued through the control of the political institutions and security forces. The 2017 independence referendum must be understood as an attempt to thwart the threat to this social arrangement represented by a wave of popular protests. These events reveal the profound connection between Kurdish nationalism and the region’s class structure. They also allow us to appreciate the–often neglected–political agency of the subaltern classes in a rentier society

Whose Kurdistan? Class politics and Kurdish nationalism in the Middle East, 1918-2018

This thesis is a study of the different trajectories of Kurdish nationalism in the Middle East. In the late 2010s – years of momentous advance for Kurdish forces in Turkey, Iraq, and Syria – Kurdish politics was deeply divided into competing movements pursuing irreconcilable projects for the future of the Kurdish nation. By investigating nationalism as embedded in social conflicts, this thesis identifies in the class basis of Kurdish movements and parties the main reason for their political differentiation and the development of competing national projects. After the defeat of the early Kurdish revolts in the 1920s and 1930s, Kurdish nationalism in Iraq and Turkey diverged along ideological lines due to the different social actors that led the respective national movements. In Iraq, the Kurdish national movement that emerged in the early 1960s was largely dominated by the tribal and landowning elite and primarily interested in preserving existing social hierarchies, while middle-class progressive nationalists were systematically sidelined. Conversely, in Turkey, as the Kurdish traditional elite had been co-opted into the Kemalist state in the 1950s, the nationalist struggle was resumed in the late 1970s by a generation of Kurdish students of peasant extraction that framed their project as an anti-colonial struggle and that violently opposed both Turkish security forces and Kurdish landlords. The thesis argues that these opposing trajectories of Kurdish nationalism were influenced by the evolving class structure of the newly established states of Turkey and Iraq, and by their location in the international state system and within global capitalism. The analysis of the social origins of competing ‘nationalisms’ provides a novel approach to the study of nationalism based on Historical Sociology and Political Economy and offers a materialist reading of the history of Kurdish politics

An impossible friendship: differences and similarities between fascist Italy’s and Kemalist Turkey’s foreign policies

Nonostante un periodo di costruttiva collaborazione e significative affinità tra i due regimi, l’Italia fascista e la Turchia kemalista dimostrano di essere sostanzialmente in antitesi nel rispettivo approccio alle relazioni internazionali. L’Italia di Mussolini sviluppa una politica estera aggressiva e revisionista, mentre la Turchia repubblicana, vinta la guerra di indipendenza, prova a costruire pacifici e solidi rapporti con i vicini. L’analisi dei rapporti bilaterali tra Italia e Turchia negli anni ’20 e ’30, chiarisce la ragione del diverso comportamento adottato dai due paesi alla vigilia di e durante il secondo conflitto mondiale.Despite a period of “warmth” and some similarities between the two regimes, fascist Italy and Kemalist Turkey proved to be very different in their approach to international relations. Italy showed a very aggressive and revisionist foreign policy, whereas Turkey, won the Independence war, tried to build solid and peaceful relations with its neighbors. The analysis of Turkish-Italian bilateral relation in the 1920s and late 1930s explains the reason of the different behavior which the two countries adopted on the eve of and during the Second World War

The electronic properties of a homoleptic bisphosphine Cu(I) complex: a joint theoretical and experimental insight

The origin of the optical properties of the firstly reported stable luminescent [Cu(PP)_2]^+ complex [Cu(dppb)_2]+ [dppb = 1,2-bis(diphenylphosphino) benzene] is investigated using the exchange-correlation functional PBE0. The choice of the basis set used is discussed and a comparison with the results obtained by other functionals is performed. The role played by the bisphosphine ligands within the complex is elucidated by considering the electronic properties of the ligand alone to evidence how both the geometrical changes and the electronic interactions, induced by the inclusion of the metal cation, affect the electronic behavior of the whole system. The NBO analysis shows how the aryl groups of the ligands act as a reservoir of electrons within the complex. The electronic excitations of both the complex and of the ligand, calculated by including the solvation effects, allow to assign the lowest energy absorption broad band, recorded in CH_2Cl_2 solution. The peculiar contribution of the phosphorus atoms to the description of the high occupied MOs and the participation of the copper cation to the description of the lowest singlet excited state, is pointed out. The origin of the observed phosphorescence of the complex is attributed to a triplet state, whose SOMO is characterized by the contributions of the valence 4s and of the Rydberg 5s AOs of the metal cation, along with the lone pair orbitals of the P atoms.Si sono studiate le proprieta` ottiche del primo complesso stabile e luminescente di tipo [Cu(PP}]^+ [[Cu(dppb)$_2]^+$ [dppb = 1,2-bis(difenilfosfino) benzene], riportato in letteratura utilizzando il metodo PBE0. Si e` discussa la scelta della base orbitale utilizzata nello studio e si e` effettuato un confronto con altri metodi DFT. Si e` illustrato il ruolo dei leganti bisfosfinici nel complesso esaminando come cambia la loro geometria e configurazione elettronica con l\u27inclusione del metallo per formare il complesso. Sono state studiate le eccitazioni elettroniche del complessso e del legante includendo gli effetti di solvatazione. per assegnare la prima banda di assorbimento osservata negli spettri con i campioni in soluzioni di diclorometano. Sono stati evidenziati i contributi dell\u27atomo di fosforo alla descrizione degli orbitali occupati ad alta energia del complesso e del Cu^+ a quelli virtuali a piu` bassa energia. L\u27origine della fosforescenza del complesso e` attribuita ad uno stato di tripletto il cui SOMO e` caratterizzato dagli orbitali atomici di valenza di tipo 4s e da un orbitale di Rydberg 5s di Cu^+ e dagli orbitali atomici singolarmente occupati del fosforo

New Automated and High-Throughput Quantitative Analysis of Urinary Ketones by Multifiber Exchange-Solid Phase Microextraction Coupled to Fast Gas Chromatography/Negative Chemical-Electron Ionization/Mass Spectrometry

The present research is focused on automation, miniaturization, and system interaction with high throughput for multiple and specific Direct Immersion-Solid Phase Microextraction/Fast Gas Chromatography analysis of the urinary ketones. The specific Mass Spectrometry instrumentation, capable of supporting such the automated changeover from Negative Chemical to Electron Ionization mode, as well as the automation of the preparation procedure by new device called MultiFiber Exchange, through change of the fibers, allowed a friendly use of mass spectrometry apparatus with a number of advantages including reduced analyst time and greater reproducibility (2.01–5.32%). The detection limits for the seven ketones were less than 0.004 mg/L. For an innovative powerful meaning in high-throughput routine, the generality of the structurally informative Mass Spectrometry fragmentation patterns together with the chromatographic separation and software automation are also investigated

Land reform and Kurdish nationalism in postcolonial Iraq

Abstract: This article revisits the origins of Kurdish nationalism in Iraq, problematizing the narrative, shared by nationalists and scholars alike, that presents the 1961–1975 insurgency solely as a moment of national awakening. Placing the Kurdish revolt within the social and political conflicts of postcolonial Iraq reveals its strong connection to the Iraqi Revolution of 1958. The early stages of the 1961 revolt must be understood as a reaction of the Kurdish landed class against the post-revolutionary land reform policy and the empowerment of the peasantry. The Kurdish tribal and landowning elite successfully turned its revolt into a national revolution by forcing progressive urban nationalists into a position of subordination and demobilizing the peasantry, formerly the backbone of the anticolonial movement. The hegemonic position of the landed class, won in 1961, had long-term consequences on the development of Kurdish nationalism in Iraq determining its conservative character and the persistent marginalization and depoliticization of the subaltern classes

Carbazole-terpyridine donor–acceptor luminophores

With the aim to combine two versatile molecular units that are widely utilized in materials and coordination chemistry, bischromophoric electron donor-acceptor carbazole-terpyridine systems (Cbz-Tpy) have been synthesized and characterized. The connecting bridge between the two moieties is constituted by phenylene (1), methylene phenylene (2) and ethynylene phenylene (3), which allow tuning of the intercomponent electronic interactions. Electrochemical studies evidence that oxidation and reduction processes occur on the Cbz and Tpy units, respectively, suggesting the possibility of internal charge transfer states located at about 3.10 eV, which is confirmed by photophysical investigations. The absorption spectra of 1 and 3 show a tail above 300 nm, indicating that these conjugated systems exhibit low-energy transitions with charge-transfer character, as confirmed by theoretical studies. At 298 K, 1-3 show a complex pattern of fluorescence profiles as a function of solvent (toluene, dichloromethane, acetonitrile), often with double emissions attributed to transitions localized on individual chromophores or associated to internal charge-transfer processes. The variability of the spectral position affords multiple colours, including white (e.g.3 in acetonitrile). Definitive rationalization and assignment of transitions of 1-3 is obtained through singlet and triplet luminescence spectra at 77 K and by means of DFT and TD-DFT methods using the hybrid functional PBE0 and the long range corrected functional CAM-B3LYP with the polarizable continuum model. This work opens the route to versatile materials based on the Tpy-Cbz motif exhibiting luminescence all across the visible spectral region that can be controlled through electronic conjugation, solvent polarity, temperature, functionalization and cation binding