Security concerns remain main obstacle to Turkey's relations with China

When the Çimtaş Group was first established in China in 2002, employing more than 450 Chinese nationals over time, one of their employees' main problems was the robbing of their second or third-hand bicycles.
 
"We used to call the police to register official complaints. But today our main problem is finding parking space for our employees' cars," said Naz Türer, a board member of the group, illustrating the amazing changes that have occurred over the past decade in China.

Speaking at a conference organized last week by the Turkish Industry and Business Association (TÜSİAD), Türer explained how technology has become a part of daily life in China by saying she could pay for a "tuk tuk" (three-wheeler) even in the most remote places with her smart phone. "In China, food needs to be consumed fresh on a daily basis. The mothers of our employees order their fish daily via an application on their phones," she said in another example.

It was interesting to hear how widespread technology is in Chinese daily life, while society's access to information via the Internet is so restricted, with the Chinese government employing thousands to monitor and censor the Internet.

Türer also referred to Yiwu, the Chinese city that manufactures many of the world's flags, and which earned a reputation for knowing Donald Trump would win the U.S. presidential election. How could they predict the Trump victory with limited access to information?

Searching on Google, I found that the fact that orders for Trump flags increased while those for Hillary Clinton decreased just before the election was enough for manufacturer Yao Dan Dan to predict an election victory for Trump. Mr. Yao considered himself a Trump supporter, as he made so much money because...