Turkey 15/7/16

[rowan]

About 30 dead being reported now, including 27 cops and a suicide bomber. Almost 200 injured, including many football fans.

Death toll now approaching 40. Hate to think what the final tally is going to be.

There have been 16 terrorist attacks in Turkey this year, two of the major ones being in the capital with a combined death toll of 67. This is probably the worst, however.

[rowan]

Sobering facts...

During the last 12 months 372 people have died in terrorist attacks in Turkey and 1.837 have been injured. These have been mostly of two types - PKK targeting police/tourists, and "ISIS" targeting Kurds.

4 big terrorist attacks around the world in the last 24 hours - Turkey 38 dead, Nigeria 90 dead, Somalia 29 dead, Egypt 25 dead.

[Sandydragon]

As I said, as a neutral those words sound to me like an apologist for the Nazis or the British Empire. No difference whatsoever.

I think most reasonable and neutral observers would put Nazi Germany several rungs down on the morality ladder compared to the British Empire. We weren't always nice but if you cant spot the difference between the death camps in Poland and the stupidity of concentration camps in South Africa then I wont waste my time with the crayons drawing a picture.

As for Turkey - since the 'coup' the country seems to be sliding into the shyte. Over the past weeks many competent and loyal military officers have been replaced for not being sufficiently Islamist/pro-Russian. On returning to Turkey, many have been arrested. The speed o the governments reaction to the coup and its aftermath still raise eyebrows.

That said, keep your head down fella.

[rowan]

Things started going downhill a long time before the alleged coup attempt. That was simply a power-consolidating move, as most people here are aware. I've explained the reasons behind it all, which date back to Turkey's refusal to participate in the genocidal invasion of Iraq in 2003 and how this led to a major shift in the balance of power behind the scenes. If you can't control a democracy, turn it into a dictatorship, and control the dictactor. Standard US practice. The Gulenists, who led that revolt, have been blamed all along for weakening the military. That's why so many of them are still being arrested almost daily. Nothing to do with being pro-Russia, which is absurd.

There are obviously very big differences between the British and American empires and the Nazi Germans, most notably that the former have last a lot longer and therefore done a great deal more damage. Also, they have never been held accountable, and for that reason nothing ever really changes. Britain isn't much different today to what it was a century ago; just a great deal less powerful. Everyone sees things differently and the answer to that is not to develop a hostile attitude to those who do not share your views and values. That kind of narrow-minded aggressive approach won't getanyone anywhere in the modern era.

[rowan]

Terrorist attack at a night club popular with foreigners in the heart of Istanbul last night. 2 or 3 men entered, apparently disguised as Santa Claus, then opened fire. Death toll approaching 40

[rowan]

24 hours later and the gunman (apparently there was only one, after all) is still at large, and no one has claimed responsibility for this. It's been on TV all day but very little in the way of breaking news. Let's see what tomorrow brings...

[rowan]

State of emergency extended for another 3 months. Nothing to do with the terrorist attack. This is because they haven't finished putting every potential enemy of the government behind bars yet. Meanwhile, plans to change the constitution to strengthen the powers of the presidency are continuing...

[rowan]

Robert Fisk on the money as usual:

Turkey is alone. First, we’ll take a look at the racist reasons for this. If 39 men and women had been slaughtered in Paris or Brussels or Berlin on New Year’s Eve, the headlines would ripple on for three or four days. Two or three days if the victims had been western European. But of course, this being Turkey, which is a Muslim country – whose people are not always as white as those from “Christendom” – the headlines drifted off far more quickly. Not our lot, we Westerners said.

Thus few readers of this article will know that, proportionately, Arabs were among the largest number of casualties of this mass murder: from tiny Lebanon alone, three dead and four wounded, both Muslims and Christians. We are quite unaware of the outrage in Lebanon at the domestic television coverage of the massacre victims – morbid, sensational, deeply intrusive interviews with collapsing family members, so gruesome that even the Lebanese prime minister had to plead with journalists to leave relatives alone.

Then there are the military reasons. Hasn’t Turkey been playing fast and loose in the Syrian war? Hasn’t it allowed weapons and money to be funnelled across its border to Isis and Jabhat al-Nusra (aka al-Qaeda, the murderers of 9/11 and the heroes of eastern Aleppo) and to various US and British-backed “moderates”, who can kill without apparently being “jihadis”? Hasn’t Turkey gone back to war with its own Kurds and the Syrian Kurds, too? Hasn’t the Turkish army – the largest in Nato, although for some reason we don’t mention this these days – been a bit disloyal recently?

For last July’s attempted coup – despite all the claptrap about “Gulenists” – was essentially a military plot to overthrow President Recep Tayip Erdogan. If a democratically-elected dictator (of which there are a growing number around the world) wants to act as a conduit in a neighbour’s civil war – as Pakistan did in Afghanistan, channelling weapons, funds and fighters to combat the Russians with American and Saudi help and encouragement – what does it expect but massacres in its own major cities? Touch Afghanistan, and the Pakistanis found the Taliban marching on Islamabad. Touch Syria, and the fireworks explode in your back yard.

Then there are the political reasons. The Turks used to want to join the EU; they’re not so keen now, and who can blame them? So their present policy is to take the EU’s massive bribes (courtesy of Angela Merkel) for closing the seas to Muslim refugees trying to reach Europe and demand the promised visa-free trips to Europe for its 79 million citizens, while at the same time making up with Russia, Iran, China and any other non-Arab nations that might be friends.

Can Turkey's tourist industry survive this latest atrocity?

Oddly for a man who is nostalgic for the old Turkish empire – hence, I suppose, his newly-gilded palace in Istanbul — Erdogan has turned anti-Ottoman in his foreign policy, virtually ignoring the Arabs whom he courted after the 2011 revolutions in favour of larger powers.

Erdogan, who demanded that Trump’s name be taken off his towers in Istanbul after the then presidential candidate called for restrictions on Muslim immigrants, now thinks he may get a critic-free ride from the new guy in the White House. I wouldn’t be so sure.

And that’s part of the problem. For Erdogan is now so fickle in his alliances, shooting down a Russian jet and then cosying up to Russia’s president, loving Assad at the start of the Syrian revolution and hating him later, flirting with Europe and then jeering at the EU, that no-one in their right mind would want to get too close to the Caliph himself.

Continues here: http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/tur ... 05606.html

[Stones of granite]

State of emergency extended for another 3 months. Nothing to do with the terrorist attack. This is because they haven't finished putting every potential enemy of the government behind bars yet. Meanwhile, plans to change the constitution to strengthen the powers of the presidency are continuing...

Sounds like Erdogan is the kind of guy that you could become quite the fan of. No signs of him doing half naked photo shoots astride a sweat-glistened stallion?

[rowan]

State of emergency extended for another 3 months. Nothing to do with the terrorist attack. This is because they haven't finished putting every potential enemy of the government behind bars yet. Meanwhile, plans to change the constitution to strengthen the powers of the presidency are continuing...

Sounds like Erdogan is the kind of guy that you could become quite the fan of. No signs of him doing half naked photo shoots astride a sweat-glistened stallion?

I think he'd be more your type, Stones. After all, he was in there helping your leaders and their terrorist proxies destroy Syria; not liberating civilian hostages while the propagandists screamed hysterical accusations of 'genocide.' But not even he comes close to the evil the British and Americans have wrought upon this world. Nobody does.

[Stones of granite]

State of emergency extended for another 3 months. Nothing to do with the terrorist attack. This is because they haven't finished putting every potential enemy of the government behind bars yet. Meanwhile, plans to change the constitution to strengthen the powers of the presidency are continuing...

Sounds like Erdogan is the kind of guy that you could become quite the fan of. No signs of him doing half naked photo shoots astride a sweat-glistened stallion?

I think he'd be more your type, Stones. After all, he was in there helping your leaders and their terrorist proxies destroy Syria; not liberating civilian hostages while the propagandists screamed hysterical accusations of 'genocide.' But not even he comes close to the evil the British and Americans have wrought upon this world. Nobody does.

No, yo're wrong there (again). Unlike you I'm no fan of autocrats like Putin, Chavez, Castro etc etc. Erdogan is most definitely heading into your territory. I suspect that if he sticks a 6 inch phallic cigar in his mouth you will actually faint..

[rowan]

What a heinous little fellow you really are, Stones. Your racial hatred of Russians, Latin Americns and Turks is such that you've decided to come onto this thread and spout your nonsense here. Britain is the most mass-murdering nation in history, and all you can do is point the finger elsewere. No apology, no accountability, no honesty. Just a lot of juvenile spite. Well, it wasn't Castro, or Putin, or Chavez who destroyed Iraq, Libya and Syria. It's not Castro or Putin or Chavez who have been helping the Saudis bomb civilian targets in Yemen. Your own country, culture, education and mentality is literally the epitome of evil.

http://www.counterpunch.org/2017/01/04/ ... on-aleppo/

[rowan]

So what's in the news today:

A Turkmeni man was attacked by a mob for bearing a vague similarity to the Reina Night Club terrorist. The mob attempted to lynch him before police intervened. Though it was established that the man was definitely not the night club terrorist, the only upshot of this brutal assault appears to have been that the man was deported for overstaying. No mention of charges against those who beat the shite out of him.

Over the Xmas, incidentally, 3 gunmen took a Santa Claus hostage in a shopping mall and delivered an anti-Xmas message that was faithfully reported - verbatim - by the mainstream media here. No report yet of charges against the three gunmen.

Meanwhile, the arrest warrants are now flowing for the wives of all the military officers already in jail for suspected links to the Gulenists who are accused of carrying out the attempted so-called 'coup' last year. Apparently they were also in the service of the Gulenists.

Other than that, the main opposition party is criticizing the seemingly permanent State of Emergency we now live under in Turkey, a member of the right-wing nationalist party has resigned in protest over the president's relentless drive to change the constitution to increase the powers of the presidency, and the government is accusing the US of not supporting it enough in its heroic battle against both ISIS and similarly dastardly Kurdish 'terrorists (who have been fighting ISIS in Syria).'

Turkey - never a dull moment

[Sandydragon]

Ive copied the following from the Times. It certainly looks like Erdogan is doing his best to make himself the one stop shop of Turkish politics. It certainly puts the coup into interesting perspective.

Turkey’s parliament has begun debating proposals to extend President Erdogan’s possible term in office to 2029 and to boost his powers.

Police dispersed protesters outside parliament in Ankara with water cannon and tear gas as the debate, expected to take place over the next two to three weeks, began yesterday.

Opponents say that the changes will turn Mr Erdogan into an effective dictator with the post of prime minister abolished and the president given powers to act by decree.

As executive president, he would no longer have to be neutral in politics and could appoint the head of the army, senior judges and heads of universities. If the changes go through he would have unparalleled control of politics and society.

Mr Erdogan seemed to be facing an impossible task in clinging on to power when he was forced to step down from the prime minister’s office in 2014 and take up the mainly ceremonial presidency, a job that theoretically demands political neutrality.




His ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) failed to muster the two-thirds majority in parliament needed to push through the changes in two elections in 2015.

At the same time, his standing was damaged by the failure of his attempts to engineer the overthrow of the Assad regime in neighbouring Syria, terrorist attacks by both Islamic State and Kurdish guerrillas that have killed hundreds of people and by a slump in the value of the lira.

However, a coup attempt against the government last year provided the pretext to bring forward the proposals again, and this time he has won the support of the right-wing nationalist party, the MHP.

The vote is on a knife-edge. The two parties need 330 votes out of 550 in parliament to bring the issue to a referendum and have 355 votes between them, but the issue has split the MHP and so far at least seven of its MPs have said they will defy the leadership.

The two other main political parties, the liberal CHP and the pro-Kurdish HDP, are both opposing the changes.

Under current rules, the president can only be re-elected once. However, the proposed constitution would wipe the slate clean, and Mr Erdogan’s two allowable five-year terms would begin at the next election, scheduled for 2019.

Assuming he won both elections, and there is currently no politician in Turkey to rival his stature, by 2029 he will have been in power for 27 years, including 12 years as prime minister — far longer than any other modern leader.

“They are trying to turn the democratic parliamentary regime into a totalitarian regime,” said Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the CHP leader, as civil society groups tried to march on parliament yesterday morning.

Thousands of academics, journalists, lawyers, police and army officers have been rounded up since the coup, accused of supporting Fethullah Gulen, an exiled Islamist former ally of Mr Erdogan.

The AKP says the new system would be more democratic, ensuring that power always resided with a directly elected president rather than parliamentary coalitions.

“It is a model that will represent democracy,” the party’s general-secretary, Abdulhamit Gul, told Kriter, a magazine close to the government.

[rowan]

Yes, I've read this (or something almost identical) and it's pretty much on the money. I've also said all along that this process began almost immediately after the Turkish army failed to obey Washington's orders and join the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Since then Erdogan has not only assumed seemingly super human powers while remaining the country's undisputed leader in one form or another, he also seems to have extraordinary "luck" - albeit of a macabre variety - with timely terrorist attacks (attributed to ISIS, though they never took the credit for them), as well as a horribly bungled 'coup' attempt - evidently aiding his cause. In spite of all this, however, I don't think Turkey is headed for a dictatorship of the North Korean or Egyptian varieties. To be honest, Erdogan appears to be following the Putin political model, he unquestionably enjoys the same degree of popularity,' and he obviously wants to remain the Big Man of Turkish politics for the foreseeable future.

Ive copied the following from the Times. It certainly looks like Erdogan is doing his best to make himself the one stop shop of Turkish politics. It certainly puts the coup into interesting perspective.

Turkey’s parliament has begun debating proposals to extend President Erdogan’s possible term in office to 2029 and to boost his powers.

Police dispersed protesters outside parliament in Ankara with water cannon and tear gas as the debate, expected to take place over the next two to three weeks, began yesterday.

Opponents say that the changes will turn Mr Erdogan into an effective dictator with the post of prime minister abolished and the president given powers to act by decree.

As executive president, he would no longer have to be neutral in politics and could appoint the head of the army, senior judges and heads of universities. If the changes go through he would have unparalleled control of politics and society.

Mr Erdogan seemed to be facing an impossible task in clinging on to power when he was forced to step down from the prime minister’s office in 2014 and take up the mainly ceremonial presidency, a job that theoretically demands political neutrality.




His ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) failed to muster the two-thirds majority in parliament needed to push through the changes in two elections in 2015.

At the same time, his standing was damaged by the failure of his attempts to engineer the overthrow of the Assad regime in neighbouring Syria, terrorist attacks by both Islamic State and Kurdish guerrillas that have killed hundreds of people and by a slump in the value of the lira.

However, a coup attempt against the government last year provided the pretext to bring forward the proposals again, and this time he has won the support of the right-wing nationalist party, the MHP.

The vote is on a knife-edge. The two parties need 330 votes out of 550 in parliament to bring the issue to a referendum and have 355 votes between them, but the issue has split the MHP and so far at least seven of its MPs have said they will defy the leadership.

The two other main political parties, the liberal CHP and the pro-Kurdish HDP, are both opposing the changes.

Under current rules, the president can only be re-elected once. However, the proposed constitution would wipe the slate clean, and Mr Erdogan’s two allowable five-year terms would begin at the next election, scheduled for 2019.

Assuming he won both elections, and there is currently no politician in Turkey to rival his stature, by 2029 he will have been in power for 27 years, including 12 years as prime minister — far longer than any other modern leader.

“They are trying to turn the democratic parliamentary regime into a totalitarian regime,” said Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the CHP leader, as civil society groups tried to march on parliament yesterday morning.

Thousands of academics, journalists, lawyers, police and army officers have been rounded up since the coup, accused of supporting Fethullah Gulen, an exiled Islamist former ally of Mr Erdogan.

The AKP says the new system would be more democratic, ensuring that power always resided with a directly elected president rather than parliamentary coalitions.

“It is a model that will represent democracy,” the party’s general-secretary, Abdulhamit Gul, told Kriter, a magazine close to the government.

[rowan]

[rowan]

Breaking news here with the apparent capture of the Reina night club terrorist...

Seems he was still living right here in Istanbul. Unbelievable!

[rowan]

No update on the capture of the Reina night club terrorist yet. I'm sure they're busy trying to extract information from him right now, but so far nothing has come to light...

Meanwhile, the prosecutor in the case against charismatic Kurdish Party leader Selehattin Demirtas, whose popularity saw him gain the required 10% threshhold for direct representation in government (& almost scuppered the president's relentless drive to change the constitution in order to greatly enhance the president's powers( wants to throw him behind bars for up to 142 years.


Indictments regarding the jailed co-leaders of the Kurdish issue-focused Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) have been completed, with the prosecutor seeking up to 142 years in jail for Selahattin Demirtaş and up to 83 years in jail for Figen Yüksekdağ.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/prosec ... sCatID=338

It seems the murder of Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in Istanbul a decade ago was 'deliberately not prevented' by the authorities:

Ali Fuat Yılmazer, the former head of Turkey’s police intelligence branch, has given his testimony in the 31st hearing into the 2007 killing of Armenian-origin Turkish journalist Hrant Dink, saying the killing was “deliberately not prevented” and security authorities in Istanbul and Trabzon were responsible.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/hrant- ... sCatID=509

A 16-year-old has been released pending trial on accusing our glorious leader of being "corrupt" on Facebook (apparently a crime these days):

A 16-year-old student arrested on charges of insulting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been released pending trial following an objection filed by his lawyers after the case stirred national controversy.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/high-s ... sCatID=341

& a story which was practically ignored completely by the TV news here:

Kyrgyzstan on Jan. 17 observed a day of mourning as it recovered the bodies of the dozens of people killed when a Turkish cargo plane crashed into a village outside the capital a day ago.


http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/kyrgyz ... sCatID=356

Turkey - never a dull moment!!

[rowan]

The Reina night club attacker is reported to have confessed he was working for ISIS and had originally wanted to attack the more popular night life district of Taksim, which is my neighborhood, but the security was too intense there. Something doesn't quite add up though. He says he wanted to join ISIS' war on Syria, presumably to remove the government of that country, while Turkey was openly backing the rebels, who had the same goal.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/istanb ... sCatID=509

[rowan]

Business is business . . .

Britain has agreed a £100m defence deal to help develop fighter jets for the Turkish air force.
The announcement came as UK Prime Minister Theresa May met the Turkish president and prime minister in Ankara.
Mrs May said the defence agreement "underlines once again that Britain is a great, global, trading nation".
She said the UK would enhance trade relations with Turkey, and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said his country would increase trade to $20bn (£16bn).
The defence agreement between BAE Systems and Turkish Aerospace Industries is for the Turkish Fighter Programme.
The deal would pave the way for a deeper defence partnership and help to safeguard key roles at BAE Systems, the announcement says.
Mrs May said: "It marks the start of a new and deeper trading relationship with Turkey and will potentially secure British and Turkish jobs and prosperity for decades to come."

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-38779669?pos ... 503438#_=_

[rowan]

A growing number of immigrants from the Turkic regions of Central Asia have now been rounded up in relation to the Reina night club attack, and while the official line is that they are all die-hard ISIS terrorists, word on the street here is that they may have actully been part of a disgruntled drug ring that had a major beef with people connected to the club. Interesting theory. Personally I can't see why ISIS should be so hell-bent on the destruction of Turkey; and would ISIS really select Central Asian Turkmen as the hitmen? & then there is the final anomaly that the hitmen made no attempt to flee Istanbul - let alone Turkey. Don't they usually martyr themselves?

[rowan]

Right now the 3 major parties are in full swing campaigning for and against changes to the constitution that would greatly enhance the powers of the president. Basically Erodgan, who has already been in power for 15 years, first as PM and for the past two as president, would be given cart blanche to do as he pleases for another 12 years or so - which is why his ruling AKP party is pushing it. They have support from the right-wing nationalist MHP party but the main opposition, CHP, is dead set against it. The other major party, which is also against it, HDP, isn't having much say in matters these days, despite gaining the threshold for direct representation iin government during the most recent elections, as the AKP subsequently threw all their leaders into prison for a few hundred years or so. They can do that, since we're still technically under emergency law here in the wake of the so-called "coup attempt" which was reported to have occurred in the middle of last year. So this news comes as no surprise to anybody ...

The number of arrested and convicted individuals have risen by 232 percent in Turkey in the last 15 years, while the population increased only by 13.8 percent, the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) said in a communique it released to lay out human rights violations committed under the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) since it came to power in 2002, daily Cumhuriyet reported on Feb. 12

The communique prepared by party members and led by Zeynep Altıok, the party’s Human and Nature Rights representative and deputy chair, laid out compiled numerical data on human rights violations that occurred in various fields under the 12-year rule.

The number of arrested and convicted individuals in jail was 59,429 when the AKP took office. In 2016, the number rose to 197,297, showing a 232 percent hike, which is disproportionate to the 13.8 rise in population, according to the data.

Between 2010 and 2015, the number of unsolved murders was 432, of which 21 parliamentary inquiries about them were sent to probe, but had been dropped after AKP deputies disapproved to follow the cases.

During the five years, 1,299 people had been convicted without fair trial, the report said, adding that according to the Rule of Law Index 2016 results, Turkey ranked 99th among 113 countries. Turkey was also ranked sixth among countries that had the least control over their governments. Meanwhile, Turkey in 2015 topped a list of European countries that violated the European Convention on Human Rights, with 20 violations to the right to fair trial and 28 violations of freedom of expression.

The number of people probed for insulting the president was also a worrying issue, according to the CHP. The number of dossiers opened for President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan skyrocketed to 1845 when compared with cases for former presidents Abdullah Gül and Ahmet Necdet Sezer, who respectively had 139 and 26 cases only.

The CHP also said the state of press freedom was concerning and appalling, noting that between 2002 and 2015, there were 184 journalists arrested, while 150 journalists in total were arrested since July 27, 2016. According to World Press Freedom Index, Turkey ranked 151st among 180 countries, and in a report by the Committee to Protect Journalists, it appeared as the top country in the world with the highest number of journalists in jail. During the 15-year AKP rule, some 112,024 websites were shut down, categorizing Turkey as “not free” in internet freedom.

The report also shed light on the number of dismissed public officials and academics as part of state of emergency decree laws that were issued after the July 15, 2016 coup attempt, saying that the number was more than those dismissed during the September 12, 1980 military coup in Turkey. It added that only in 161 days, 30,470 teachers, 3,957 academics, and 3,456 judges and prosecutors had been dismissed.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/main-o ... sCatID=339

[rowan]

The other major party, which is also against it, HDP, isn't having much say in matters these days, despite gaining the threshold for direct representation iin government during the most recent elections, as the AKP subsequently threw all their leaders into prison for a few hundred years or so.

That's the Kurdish party, btw. Kurds are regarded as the indigenous peoples of south-east Turkey.

[rowan]

& in pushing for the Yes vote the latest tack by the ruling party has been to claim the HDP are tied to the PKK militant group, who Turkey considers terrorists, and since the HDP is against the changes to the constitution anyone who votes No will therefore be supporting the terrorists. This message, of course, is roared with thunderous self-righteousness directly into our homes through our television brainwashing machines.

[rowan]

This comes as no surprise to anyone:




Around 70 percent of Turkish citizens have never participated in any culture or arts event in their lives, according to a new report from the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV) based on data from research firms GfK and Ipsos.

According to the Ipsos 2016 “Understanding Turkey Guide,” 49 percent of Turkish people have never been to the cinema, 66 percent have never been to a concert, theater or opera events, and 39 percent have never read a book.

The study showed that some 85 percent of respondents said their favorite culture/arts activity is “watching TV,” while 47 percent of people said they do not read any magazines, while almost 90 percent said they have never been to a hobby or interest course in their lives.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/70-per ... sCatID=385