Turkey in limbo as Erdogan falls short

Turkey’s ruling Islamic-rooted party is facing turbulence as it is likely to need a coalition partner to form the next government after suffering surprisingly strong losses in a national vote. Other parties vowed to resist any such pact.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Islamic-based Justice and Development Party, known as AKP, won less than 41% of the vote in Sunday’s election for Turkey’s 550-seat parliament. It was projected to take 258 seats, still top of the political heap but 18 seats below the minimum needed to rule alone.

The results dealt a direct slap to Erdogan, who had hoped to reshape Turkey’s democracy into one in which his increasingly powerful presidency, rather than the parliament, would wield most control of government affairs.