Word: ankara
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...world's attention will be focused on the Christian-Muslim religious divide. But the pontiff is also crossing a political fault line: The gulf between Europe and the Near East has been much in the news lately because of Turkey's troubled attempts to join the European Union. Ankara is keen to become a full member, but Europeans are having second thoughts. Skeptics, including the Pope himself, are openly questioning whether a mostly Muslim nation of 70 million can ever really be part of Europe...
...there is no hiding the fact that this is, above all, a diplomatic mission. A meeting Tuesday in Ankara with Turkey's head of religious affairs, Ali Bardakoglu, will be a chance for Benedict to try to definitively close the two-month fallout from his provocative remarks about Islam and the prophet Muhammad during a lecture at a German university. Many have tried to predict what the Pope might say about Islam, but most Vatican sources assure TIME that the Turkey trip will most definitely not be the occasion for a provocative follow-up to his University of Regensburg speech...
...requirements that have been set out by Brussels. This opening on Europe may help explain why, after having originally said it was impossible, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyiip Erdogan confirmed Monday that he would in fact meet Benedict on Tuesday afternoon at the Ankara airport, just before the Turkish leader flies off to a NATO summit. Still the most substantial achievements could be made in further healing relations with the Orthodox, a thousand years after the two churches parted ways. Many believe that Benedict can make more progress on this front than John Paul, who was seen by some Orthodox...
SAIT T. TANGOR Ankara, Turkey...
Actually, Benedict will probably try to stay away from matches during his successive stops in Ankara, Ephesus and Istanbul. Speculation about what the Pope will say and do on this visit has consumed Rome for weeks. Papal watchers say Benedict cannot out-Regensburg himself, but gauzy talk about the compatibility of Christianity and Islam isn't likely either. Over the course of his career, Benedict has been averse to reciting multifaith platitudes, an aversion that has sharpened as he has focused on Islam. And that's what could make his coming encounter with the Muslim world, says David Gibson, author...