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Turkey
Political parties fail to come to terms on release of jailed deputies
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16 May 2012
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CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu and other party executives visit jailed CHP deputy Mehmet Haberal, who was allowed to leave prison in April to attend his mother’s funeral. (Photo: AA)
TODAY’S ZAMAN, İSTANBUL There is no sign of agreement among the political parties in Turkey over a plan for the release of jailed deputies from prison and it seems unlikely that the parties will reach a consensus regarding the issue in the near future, recent developments have shown.
On Tuesday, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan -- who is also the leader of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) -- told his party in a parliamentary address that a political formula to save the jailed deputies from prison would not work and advised politicians to leave the issue to courts and judges. “There cannot be a [political] formula for this [release of jailed deputies]. We have to wait for a decision from judicial bodies,” he said.
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Turkey blocks Israel from NATO summit
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23 April 2012
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ANKARA - Hürriyet Daily News
Turkey blocks the participation of Israel in a NATO summit in May despite calls from NATO allies including the US. ‘There will be no Israeli presence unless they issue a formal apology’ for Mavi Marmara attack, says an official
Minister Davutoğlu conveys Turkey’s veto on Israel to a NATO summit. DHA photo
Serkan DemirtaşTurkey has blocked the participation of Israel in a key NATO summit that will take place in Chicago on May 20 and 21, despite calls from influential allies including the United States, Western diplomatic have sources told the Hürriyet Daily News. The veto was conveyed to the NATO bodies by Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu during the Alliance’s meeting last week in Brussels.
“There will be no Israeli presence at the NATO meeting unless they issue a formal apology and pay compensation for the Turkish citizens their commandos killed in international waters” a senior Turkish official told the Daily News.
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Erdoğan says Turks, Iraqis still brothers despite Maliki’s enmity
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23 April 2012
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Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan attended the Turkish-Arab Tourism Fair held in the western province of Bursa on Sunday
GÖZDE NUR DONAT, ANKARA
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has added fuel to an escalating war of words between Turkey and Iraq by slamming his Iraqi counterpart, Nouri al-Maliki, over his remarks in which he said Turkey is becoming a hostile state in the region due to its policies, noting that Turkey still has brotherly relations with all sects and ethnicities in Iraq despite Maliki's enmity toward Turkey.
“Maliki's attitude cannot damage our relations with our Iraqi brothers,” Erdoğan said upon his return from Qatar on Saturday.
In a written press statement on Friday, Maliki accused Turkey of becoming a hostile state, engaging in “unjustified interferences in Iraqi internal affairs,” “still… dreaming [of] controlling the region” and of becoming “an aggressive state for all [in the region].”
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More detention warrants issued as Feb. 28 investigation deepens
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19 April 2012
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This 2000 file photo shows retired Maj. Gen. Erol Özkasnak. (Photo: Today's Zaman)
TODAYSZAMAN.COM
Turkish police raided the homes of several retired and active-duty military officers in six provinces as prosecutors deepened an investigation into the Feb. 28, 1997 unarmed military intervention, detaining dozens more.
Initial reports said most of the addresses searched are the homes of former military officers who played a major role in the 1997 military intervention, known as the “postmodern coup.” Among the homes searched by police is the house of retired Maj. Gen. Erol Özkasnak, known to have played a major role in the coup generals' communication with the media to force the then-government to resign.
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29 actors of Feb. 28 postmodern coup detained in police operations
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13 April 2012
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İsmail Hakkı Karadayı (L), Çevik Bir (2nd from L), Güven Erkaya (3rd from L), Erol Özkasnak (R)
FAZLI MERT, İSTANBUL
Twenty-nine retired military officers including retired Gen. Çevik Bir, who is known to have played a major role in the Feb. 28, 1997 unarmed military intervention, were detained on Thursday as police raided dozens of premises in three provinces as part of an investigation into the 1997 coup.
The intervention is often referred to as a “postmodern” coup d'état due to the fact that as bloodless as it was, it was able to bring down a government. Turkey's government was led by an Islamist-leaning party at the time.
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Democratization gains momentum in Turkey, much remains to be done
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08 April 2012
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Former Turkish general Kenan Evren (C) is seen with force commanders of the time during a military ceremony after the 1980 military coup in this file photo.
FATMA DIŞLI ZIBAK, İSTANBUL
The political stagnation that followed last year’s general elections seems to have disappeared as there have been significant improvements in major cases in the country that are helping the nation confront its past and strengthen its democracy; however, observers say there is much more to do for Turkey to become a fully democratic country.
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Court says torture claims to be investigated in 1980 coup case
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07 April 2012
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A Turkish woman holds a placard with a combination of images showing seven leftist students killed before a coup on the second day of a trial of two elderly leaders of a 1980 military coup, outside a courthouse in Ankara on April 5, 2012. (Photo: AP)RELATED NEWSTODASYZAMAN.COM,
An Ankara court accepted a request on Friday, from a prosecutor overseeing the recently launched 1980 coup case, to also investigate victim claims of torture, maltreatment and murder by torture during the coup era.
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Turkey’s main opposition occupies Parliament, crisis deepens
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09 February 2012
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AK Party and CHP deputies started fistfight after Çiçek issued a session break (Photo: AA)
TODAYSZAMAN.COM
Turkish main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) has physically occupied Parliament’s rostrum Wednesday night in outrage of a parliamentary bylaw sponsored by the ruling party CHP claims is designed to silence the opposition.
The government's recent effort to amend the parliamentary bylaw has created chaos in the Parliament last week, escalating on Wednesday as members of the main opposition occupied the Parliament’s rostrum to protest the new amendment.
Last week, fifty CHP deputies rushed furiously into the hall where the parliamentary Constitutional Commission was discussing the bill to amend the bylaw and stated that they were determined to block the amendments. After the bill to amend the bylaw was sent to Parliament's plenary session for approval, the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) jumped on the CHP bandwagon of unrelenting opposition, completely blocking the functioning of Parliament.
Seeing the ruling party's determination to pass the bill at all costs, the opposition camp further intensified its efforts to produce a harsher confrontation and resorted to every filibustering method available.
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Turkey is turning into an open prison
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30 January 2012
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AKP prison record, nine years on: 127 thousand 831 prisoners in 2011
While the AKP government is jailing all opponent sectors of society and Kurds in particular, Turkey has almost been turned into an open prison within the process of the AKP government in the last ten years. The number of prisoners and detained people, which was 59 thousand 428 in 2002, the year when AKP first came to the power, this number increased by 114 percent in nine years and rose to 127 thousand 831 in the year of 2011.
According to the data by the National Judiciary Network Project 2011, a total of 127 thousand 831 people are held in 418 prisons in Turkey. Among these people, 36 thousand 462 are prisoners on remand, 17 thousand 950 are jailed without definite conviction and 73 thousand 419 are convicted.
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Tens of thousands march in protest of Hrant Dink verdict
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20 January 2012
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Tens of thousands of demonstrators march from İstanbul's Taksim Square to the site of Hrant Dink murder five years ago, the Agos newspaper headquarters in Şişli. (Photo: AA)
TODAY’S ZAMAN, İSTANBUL
Some 40,000 people were out on the streets on Thursday in various provinces across Turkey to commemorate Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant Dink, who was shot dead outside his newspaper’s office in Şişli on Jan. 19, 2007, two days after a court verdict that established that there was no “criminal organization” link in the assassination, although plenty of evidence suggests otherwise.
A large crowd gathered in Taksim at 1 p.m., but there were other events in the same area in the evening as well. Other cities that saw large crowds gathering both to commemorate Dink and to protest the court verdict, which they say didn’t find or punish the real perpetrators who organized the murder, included Ankara, İzmir and Adana.
Dink’s family and friends and human rights organizations placed red carnations on the spot where Dink was shot dead in İstanbul outside the office of Agos, the Armenian newspaper where he was editor-in-chief.
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