“Turkey faces a number of challenges, and one of them is that the central bank needs to be fully independent so it can continuously assess and tighten policies as circumstances change in a forward-looking manner,” Poul Thomsen, director of the International Monetary Fund’s Europe department, told.

“So we welcome the increase we’ve seen in interest rates in the last six to seven months, but it’s important that the Turkish central bank be allowed to be fully independent in its assessment of monetary policy in addition to a number of other challenges on fiscal policy, and more transparency.”

Turkey’s economy is already in recession, rocked last year after fears over government interference into central bank independence, over-leveraged banks, a large current account deficit and a diplomatic spat with the U.S. triggered investor and capital flight. Moody’s expects the Turkish economy to contract by 2% in 2019.