What Happened in Turkey in the Night of 15 July 2016?

The seminar will be centered around the failed coup attempt which was attempted on 15 July 2016. Ambassador of Turkish Republic Ahmet Necati Bigalı will speak about the coup and events that have taken place after the failed coup. He will be joined by journalist Marek Hudema, expert and foreign correspondent with experience from Middle East countries. The debate will be chaired by our Seniour Researcher, Vít Beneš. This interesting trio will provide for intriguing debate.

H.E. Ahmet Necati Bigalı has served as Turkey’s Ambassador to the Czech Republic since July 2014. He began his career in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1983 as an Attaché for bilateral political affairs for Cyprus and Greece after completing his studies in law at Dokuz Eylul University. Prior to his posting to Prague he served as Senior Diplomatic Advisor to the Prime Minister and as the Turkish Ambassador to The People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria. These roles followed a range of positions including First Secretary at the Turkish embassies in the UK, Iran, and Greece and Counsellor at the Turkish embassies in Turkmenistan and The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. In addition to his diplomatic postings Mr Ahmet Necati Bigalı has also held several senior administrative positions at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs including Minister Plenipotentiary, Head of Human Resources Department and Acting Head of Department, Deputy Directorate General for International Organisations. He is proficient in Turkish, English and French.

Mr Marek Hudema is a journalist for the Foreign Desk of Hospodářské Noviny, a daily Czech newspaper focusing on economic affairs. He covers the Middle East, Asia and Africa and focuses particularly on the developing countries of these areas. Until 2014 he specialised on EU affairs. Mr Hudema began his career in the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1996 before serving in the Ministry of Industry and Trade as an advisor to the Minister. He has since served in a range of public affairs roles including as Press Secretary for the US-ODA Caucus of the Senate of the Czech Parliament and as a Research Manager for Euroffice Praha – Brusel a.s. From 2004 onward he has worked as a journalist for a number of Czech magazines and newspapers including Respekt, Reflex and Lidové Noviny before starting his current role in November 2010.

Vít Beneš is Senior Researcher at the Institute of International Relations, among his fields of EU enlargement, European integration, European dimension of Czech foreign policy, Turkey-EU relations, IR theories, theories of European integration and methodology of IR research.

Working language is English.