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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

Turkey's ruling party is passing constitutional reforms to consolidate power [reuters.com]:

Turkey's parliament approved the first seven articles in a second round of voting overnight on a constitutional bill that will extend President Tayyip Erdogan's powers, keeping the reform on course for a spring referendum.

The two largest opposition parties in parliament say the 18-article bill, which could enable Erdogan to rule until 2029, will fuel authoritarianism in the NATO member and European Union candidate country. The ruling AK Party, backed by the nationalist MHP, says it will bring the strong executive leadership needed to prevent a return to the fragile coalition governments of the past.

The seven articles approved overnight include increasing the number of MPs to 600 from 550, lowering the minimum age to be a lawmaker to 18 from 25, and holding parliamentary and presidential elections together every five years.

Also at CNN [cnn.com], Time [time.com], Al Jazeera [aljazeera.com], and The Guardian [theguardian.com]. You might also be interested in this take [dailysabah.com] from the Daily Sabah [wikipedia.org].

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