ErdoFascism turks In Their Natural Behavior

[MosJan]

[MosJan]

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wins reelection for 5 more years of power
Turkey's incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdogan officially won the country's runoff election over the weekend, extending his two-decade hold on power. CBS News foreign correspondent Imtiaz Tyab has more.
MAY 29, 2023

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

Armenian Prime Minister to attend Erdogan inauguration

17:31, 2 June 2023

YEREVAN, JUNE 2, ARMENPRESS. Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan will attend Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s inauguration to his third term in Ankara.

The Prime Minister’s Office said Pashinyan accepted the offer to participate in the inauguration and will travel to Ankara on June 3.

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1112426.html?fbclid=IwAR2WCoyc_WBEnAnjLK-TtPmE44Vildkb3aGFREuV36OhDc6wFDsaYJ9EUAM

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

PM Nikol Pashinyan attends inauguration of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan

21:44, 3 June 2023

YEREVAN, JUNE 3, ARMENPRESS. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan attended on June 3 the inauguration ceremony of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Ankara.

Prime Minister Pashinyan was welcomed by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu at the presidential complex.

Leaders and high-ranking representatives of other countries were also present at the event.

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1112489.html?fbclid=IwAR15VyBwfoloG_WHgmXq18iNYWhH6fmnSgacP3D9krI4dtFpSW3HZElPWIk

[Yervant1]

AEI.org

Congress Should Shut Down Biden’s Turkey-Sweden Quid Pro Quo

By Michael Rubin

AEIdeas

June 08, 2023

Secretary of State Antony Blinken may have denied any deal to trade Turkey F-16s in exchange for the lifting of Turkey’s veto on Sweden’s NATO accession, but no one told the White House that. Not only has President Joe Biden alluded to just such a deal, but also National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has apparently outlined the quid pro quo to key Congressional leaders.

On the surface, such a trade may seem both straightforward and logical: Turkey wants F-16s, the United States wants Sweden in NATO. Turkey has the ability to greenlight Sweden’s accession.

Biden and Sullivan may want to claim credit for a deal and bask in the glow of success, but it would be an illusion: Sweden’s accession under such circumstances would be a strategic disaster.

Consider:

• The deal would reward President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s blackmail. Not only will Erdogan hold NATO hostage again, but other countries will also follow suit. In the past, Washington assumed NATO members would try to do the right thing; in the future, various governments will look at looming votes as an opportunity to win the lottery.
• Sweden’s accession would be welcome, but its symbolic importance is minor. More important is European unity in the face of Russian aggression. That unity exists whether or not Sweden joins NATO. Sweden might just as easily act in concert with NATO without submitting to Turkish blackmail.
• Nothing Sweden brings to NATO would be a game-changer. Certainly, Sweden’s handful of diesel submarines would be welcome, but they do not offer NATO a capability that would significantly change the operational environment. Finland is another matter: not only does it border Russia, but it also has more artillery pieces than the United Kingdom, France, or Germany.
• The price Turkey demands from Sweden erodes the quality of Sweden’s democracy. It would be far better for the White House to encourage Turkey to adopt Swedish democracy than for it to encourage Sweden to bend toward Turkish autocracy. It is bad enough Turkey represses Kurdish identity; it should not demand Sweden do the same.
• Upgrading Turkey’s F-16 fleet will do little to enhance NATO. Turkey does not use its jet fighters for NATO’s defense or to preserve regional stability; rather, it consistently uses its F-16s to bomb Syrian Kurds, Iraqi Yezidis, and threaten Greek islands. Biden and Sullivan should carefully consider both whether a photo-op welcoming Sweden into NATO is worth increasing the danger of an intra-NATO military clash or whether NATO can even survive such a fight.

Make no mistake: One day, NATO should welcome Sweden as a full member, but timing and circumstances matter. Congress is a co-equal branch of government. Its leaders—both Democrat and Republican—should balk at White House pressure to accede to a bad deal and a counterproductive quid pro quo.

A far better response would be to tell Sullivan that Congress will disallow new F-16s or upgrades to Turkey until Erdogan is gone and Turkey’s behavior changes. If that means tabling Sweden’s NATO accession, so be it. Plan B might be greater military cooperation between Sweden, the United States, and key NATO members. Such a response would mean all the military capability, none of the blackmail, and a more stable Europe.

Learn more: Voice of America Mismanagement Is a National Security Issue | Greed, Not Just Politics, Is Corrupting the Image of the Military | Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s Ego Will Cost Armenian Lives | Will Joe Biden Destroy NATO by Appeasing Turkey on Sweden?

 

 

https://www.aei.org/foreign-and-defense-policy/congress-should-shut-down-bidens-turkey-sweden-quid-pro-quo/

[Yervant1]

 

WashingtonExaminer.com

Opinion

 

Let Turkey fail

by Michael Rubin

May 31, 2023 11:08 AM

Recep Tayyip Erdogan will continue his authoritarian rule well into its third decade. International observers confirmed elections were neither free nor fair. Those who claim Erdogan won fairly focus on balloting, but what preceded it tipped the scales: arrests of opposition candidates, state media amplifying Erdogan while largely ignoring his competitors, and local authorities approving Erdogan’s rallies while denying opponents equal access to the public square.

Nor should the West take the fairness of balloting at face value. Just as balance-of-payments errors gave early insight into the illegal financial plays of Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party two decades ago at a time when most diplomats and journalists praised his economic stewardship, so too does demographic data raise serious questions about the veracity of voter rolls. Simply put, analysts should never trust data from dictators.

A DEBT LIMIT WIN FOR THE GOP

Some analysts called foul about questions regarding the voting numbers of naturalized Syrians, Afghans, or other recent immigrants to Turkey. While opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu’s anti-Syrian populism especially ahead of the second round was nativist if not racist, this does not diminish real problems in the demographic data. The basic problem is that the increase in voting rolls does not appear to coincide with international estimates of birth and death rates over the same period. Even these are uncertain.

Turkish demographers identify the error in population statistics as between 1.5 and 6.7 million, but this depends on at which date between 2007 and 2018 they stop taking Turkish statistics at face value and begin to track problems, especially with statistical manipulation by the Turkish Statistical Institute after the COVID-19 outbreak. What is clear is few Turks believe TUIK; its own employees privately warn not to, and so it is curious that so many outside analysts do. The question then becomes what explains the extra population on the voting rolls. Officially, there are fewer than 200,000 new naturalized Syrians. The error, though, suggests a much larger number of new voters.

Some Turks explain that supposed new citizens do not live in the towns where they are registered. On Election Day, busloads of young male foreigners arrived to vote in towns before returning to larger cities where they actually reside. Turks say this might explain why the vote count in certain areas was 2-3% above predictions for Erdogan. The problem is, since locals did not know these new voters in the locations they voted, it was hard to sniff out legitimacy.

A greater problem is voting with fraudulent IDs, borrowed either from the dead or simply with ghost names. To be fair, while this was a problem anecdotally, it is hard to assign a number to the votes cast by Syrian, Afghan, Pakistani, Iraqi, and African citizens. Compounding this problem was the fact that the opposition (let alone outside, neutral observers) were not present in many polling stations. A few thousand boxes from these voting stations apparently had votes only for Erdogan. In some cases, voters expressed surprise the results showed 100% for Erdogan when they had voted for Kilicdaroglu, though not everyone would publicly say so due to fear of retaliation. Such questions about Election Day are important given that a swing of just 1.2 million votes could change the outcome.

That said, the outcome of Turkey’s elections was never in doubt; to pretend otherwise only bestows false legitimacy on the process. The question now is how to proceed.

Erdogan’s stewardship has been an economic disaster. Turkey increasingly looks to follow Venezuela’s path into hyperinflation and financial implosion. This will be tragic for Turks, but neither Washington nor Brussels should snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. There should be no F-16s for Turkey. Erdogan will sooner use them against his neighbors than for defense. Just as with Iran today, the United States and NATO should differentiate between the repressive regime and the people whom it represses.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Turkey one day will have its color revolution. Repression does not last forever. Sometimes countries must fail before they can rebuild.

Michael Rubin (@mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner's Beltway Confidential blog. He is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/let-turkey-fail?fbclid=IwAR1tmOtBA4TEzmDqwoX_rZEgCHaAALVnrhaUvC-hUnJmUAu---ecK09Wsz4

[Yervant1]

Politico.eu

Erdoğan pulls out of European summit

The Turkish leader, who won reelection Sunday, was expected to attend the meeting, which is meant as a show of solidarity against Russia.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan | Adem Altan/AFP via Getty Images

By Clea Caulcutt and Suzanne Lynch

May 31, 2023 2:11 pm CET

2 minutes read

CHISINAU — A massive gathering of European leaders on Thursday has suffered its first high-profile casualty, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan pulling out at the last minute.

The Turkish leader, who won five more years at the helm of his country in second-round elections on Sunday, will not travel to Moldova for the one-day summit, according to three officials involved in the preparations.

The so-called European Political Community (EPC) — a new collective launched in the wake of Russia’s war in Ukraine — is meant to draw together European leaders beyond the EU. More than 40 European leaders will be present Thursday, including those from all 27 EU countries plus non-EU countries like Britain and Turkey, as well as the Western Balkan nations.

The gathering, set to take place outside Chișinău, Moldova’s capital, is the second summit held under the EPC banner, following an inaugural meeting in Prague last October.

Erdoğan attended that summit in the Czech capital but clashed with his Greek counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis during an end-of-summit dinner.

Erdoğan, who has dominated Turkey’s politics for two decades, won the country’s election on Sunday, despite a strong showing by a coalition of opposition parties.

The 69-year-old leader is expected to announce his new Cabinet on Friday with an inauguration scheduled for the following day.

European leaders started arriving in the Moldovan capital of Chișinău Wednesday ahead of the summit, which is taking place in a castle and winery 35 kilometers outside the city.

https://www.politico.eu/article/blow-for-epc-as-erdogan-pulls-out-of-summit/

[MosJan]

[MosJan]

just in case #%%#$

[Yervant1]

July 2 2023

Armenian Americans Call for Cancellation of Disney Atatürk Series

ByAlexander Gale

July 2, 2023

The Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) has called on Disney to cancel its upcoming series about the life of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founding father of the modern Turkish state.

The ANCA accused Dinsey of glorifying a “dictator and genocide killer”. Meanwhile, Turkish media called the response “reactionary”.

The series is scheduled for release on October 29 this year, to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the Republic of Turkey. Disney has made no indication that it will consider canceling the series.

Armenian American community critical of Disney over Atatürk series

“Calling on@DisneyPlus to cancel its series glorifying Mustafa Kemal Ataturk – a Turkish dictator and genocide killer with the blood of millions of #Greek #Armenian #Assyrian #Chaldean #Syriac #Aramean #Maronite and other #Christian martyrs on his hands,” posted the ANCA on Twitter this Thursday.

According to its official website, the ANCA “is the largest and most influential Armenian American grassroots political organization.” The organization, which is headquartered in Washington D.C., “actively advances the concerns of the Armenian American community on a broad range of issues.”

The ANCA further claimed that “Half of Turkish Twitter is desperately denying Atatürk was a genocidal killer. The other half is joyfully celebrating that Atatürk was a genocidal killer.”

One Turkish media platform, Turkish Series TV, called the reaction of the Armenian diaspora to the upcoming series “reactionary”.

The controversy surrounding the Dinsey Atatürk series highlights the intensity of longstanding grievances, which have never been fully addressed since the Armenian genocide, as well as the Pontian Greek, and Assyrian genocides.

The Armenian genocide

The Armenian genocide was the systematic massacre and forced deportation of Armenians committed by the Ottoman Empire from 1915 to 1923, during and after the First World War.

As of 2023, the governments and parliaments of 34 countries, including Argentina, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Russia, and the United States, have formally recognized the Armenian genocide.

Turkey, and its close ally Azerbaijan, as well as Pakistan, deny that the genocide took place. According to the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Infusing history with myth, Armenian Americans vilify the Republic of Türkiye, Turkish Americans, and ethnic Turks worldwide.”

“Armenians bent on this prosecution choose their evidence carefully, omitting all evidence that tends to exonerate those whom they presume guilty, ignoring important events and verifiable accounts, and sometimes relying on dubious or prejudiced sources and even falsified documents,” the ministry continues.

Beyond a merely historical dispute, the Armenian genocide and the contention surrounding it remains an important factor in diplomatic relations between Armenia and Turkey, as well as a point of potential friction between the Armenian and Turkish diasporas in various other countries.

https://greekreporter.com/2023/07/02/armenian-americans-call-for-cancellation-of-disney-ataturk-series/

[Yervant1]

NordicMonitor.com

Islamist, red flagged in IRGC Quds Force probe, is in charge of Turkey’s public education

by Abdullah Bozkurt

June 27, 2023

Yusuf Tekin, Turkey's Educatuon Minister, was red-flagged during an investigation into IRGC Quds Force network in Turkey.

Abdullah Bozkurt/Stockholm

Yusuf Tekin (50), the recently appointed minister of education, responsible for overseeing the education of nearly 20 million children in Turkey and entrusted with billions of Turkish lira to carry out that task, was red-flagged during a counterterrorism probe into the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Quds Force network, classified documents obtained by Nordic Monitor have revealed.

Tekin’s links to Quds Force operatives in Turkey were exposed during a confidential, multi-year probe into the group, known by its Turkish name, Tevhid Selam. Tekin’s communications with a specially trained Iranian operative were intercepted between December 15, 2012 and November 22, 2013, and the wiretaps were entered as evidence into the case file.

The investigation launched in 2011 by Istanbul prosecutor Adem Özcan under case file No.2011/762 identified 232 Turkish and Iranian suspects, some later designated by the US Treasury under sanctions, after painstaking surveillance of operatives, wiretapping of their phones and internet communications and a review of the shell companies that were used as covers to mask secret operations. The prosecutor’s probe lasted until 2014 before then-prime minister and now president Recep Tayyip Erdogan stepped in to kill the country’s most comprehensive counterespionage investigation in its recent history.

The case file contains 10 intercepted phone and SMS conversations between Tekin and Furkan Torlak (37), a known Iranian asset who was working as an advisor to Numan Kurtulmus, the then-deputy chairman of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and now the speaker of parliament. Torlak was a suspect and a target of the investigators, with the conversations revealing a close relationship between Torlak and Tekin, who was serving as undersecretary of the Ministry of Education at the time.

 

Wiretap secured by a judge’s approval in the IRGC Quds Force investigation reveals close links between Yusuf Tekin and Furkan Torlak:

 

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The content of these conversations suggests that Torlak was introducing his associates to Tekin and arranging meetings with him. One of the individuals Torlak introduced to Tekin was Yahya Bostan, who was also a suspect in the Quds Force probe. In a call on May 16, 2013 Torlak described Bostan as his roommate and a member of the same community, referring to a group of Islamists who promote the Iranian mullah ideology in Turkey.

Bostan currently works as the news coordinator for the state-run Anadolu news agency, but his real job is listed with Turkish intelligence agency MIT, which uses journalism as a cover to run clandestine operations. He had previously worked as news coordinator for TRT News between 2017 and 2021. Before moving to the state-funded media, he was employed by the Sabah newspaper, owned by the Turkish president’s family. Bostan often writes articles praising MIT in his weekly column for the Islamist Yeni Şafak daily.

Judging from the content of the wiretap, Bostan and Torlak had known each other for a long time, possibly going back to their younger years when Torlak had been groomed at an Iranian-run Shiite ḥawzah (seminary) in Syria from 1997, when he was 12, until he turned 21. Turkish police tracked all of Torlak’s visits to Syria, where he had spent his teenage and early adult years under the supervision of his handlers from the Quds Force.

 

Furkan Torlak, a Quds Force suspect who was groomed at Shiite seminaries in Syria.

A wiretap dated January 15, 2013 shows the two had worked together in the recruitment of an acquaintance for the ruling party, using favors to fast-track the candidate’s employment. Another wiretap dated November 21, 2013 reveals Tekin was sharing confidential government information from the ministry with Torlak by sending documents to his Yahoo email. Torlak had no official position in the government and did not have a clearance to gain access to government information.

Tekin is not the only one Torlak sourced to get his hands on government information. He was also using his wife, Sümeyye Nur Torlak, the daughter of Burhan Kavuncu, one of the leading figures in establishing the Iran-backed Hizbullah in Turkey. Kavuncu helped Torlak land advisory positions in the government as well as in the ruling AKP. He currently works as an advisor to the culture and tourism minister. His connections to the Quds Force came to light one-and-a-half years after the probe was launched, prompting the prosecutor to secure a warrant to wiretap his phone and place him under surveillance.

The wiretaps show that Torlak obtained classified documents illegally through his wife Sümeyye, who was working for the Public Security Institution (Kamu Güvenliği Teşkilatı) at the time. In the wiretap his wife told him that if she sent classified material through the mail, the government might be able to identify her as the leak. Instead, she said she would bring the hard copies home to avoid detection.

 

Another wiretap between Yusuf Tekin and Furkan Torlak:

 

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The investigation also revealed how Torlak hid his activities and education in Syria in the CVs he submitted to support his employment in government agencies at the recommendation of Sefer Turan, another suspect in the Quds Force probe. He did not want to raise red flags during background checks. Turan, currently serving as chief advisor to President Erdogan on Turkey’s relations with Arab and Muslim states, especially in the Middle East and North Africa, had worked for the Iranian-financed radical publication Yeryüzü in the 1990s promoting the Iranian mullah regime.

How the entire operation unmasked Torlak’s hidden background and his connections to Quds Force operatives was revealed during a hearing on May 31, 2018 at the Istanbul 14th High Criminal Court by Selman Yuyucu, a police chief who had worked the Quds Force investigation.

 

Another wiretap between Yusuf Tekin and Furkan Torlak:

 

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Tekin’s appointment as minister of education on June 4, 2023 means that he is now responsible for overseeing the entire public education system in Turkey. This vast system employs 1.1 million personnel, predominantly teachers, who work under his leadership to educate children from kindergarten to 12th grade. Additionally, the ministry has a global presence, with education attachés reporting directly to Tekin from Turkish embassies in 63 countries.

The ministry accounts for a significant portion of the central budget, which was 285 billion Turkish lira at the end of 2022. Moreover, it allocated 2.3 billion Turkish lira for overseas operations during the same period. With its authority to license, inspect and utilize administrative tools, the Ministry of Education also exerts considerable influence over private schools, including minority schools.

According to the ministry’s official records, 19.2 million children were educated during the 2021/2022 school year, including 732,000 Syrian refugees between ages of 5 and 17 in various schools, corresponding to 65 percent of all Syrian youngsters of school age. Each year, the ministry publishes 300 million school textbooks, which it distributes to schools after it has monitored their content.

 

Yusuf Tekin, Turkey’s minister of education.

 

https://nordicmonitor.com/2023/06/islamist-red-flagged-in-irgc-quds-force-probe-is-in-charge-of-turkeys-public-education/

[Yervant1]

NordicMonitor.com

Turkey defended pro-al Qaeda jihadist group at European court to justify jailing of a journalist

by Abdullah Bozkurt

July 1, 2023

European Court of Human Rights.

Abdullah Bozkurt/Stockholm

In a defense statement submitted to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) to justify the unlawful imprisonment of a critical Turkish journalist, the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has shockingly defended a Turkish jihadist group that called for armed jihad in support of late al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Ladin and that described Christians and Jews as infidels who should be killed wherever they are found, and even went as far as urging the beheading of Americans.

The case, brought to the Strasbourg court on May 7, 2015 by Turkish journalist Hidayet Karaca and settled on May 16, 2023 by the Second Chamber of the ECtHR, featured vigorous defense arguments raised by the Turkish government on behalf of the jihadist group Tahşiyeciler, led by Mollah Muhammed (aka Mullah Muhammed el-Kesri; real name Mehmet Doğan), an indicted radical cleric.

Karaca has been in prison since December 2014, when the Erdogan government, acting on a complaint by Mullah Muhammed and his associates, decided that the jihadist group had been smeared in an episode of a fictional TV series broadcast by Samanyolu TV and that Karaca, the the-general manager of the network, was responsible for it. Karaca was tried, convicted and sentenced to 300 years in prison for defaming the group. The conviction sent a chilling message to all Turkish journalists and rendered a radical imam untouchable under the protection of the political authorities.

The defense statements submitted to the ECtHR by the Erdogan government portrayed Mullah Muhammed’s group as a peaceful Islamist group and claimed he and his associates were slandered and had faced criminal prosecution in the past. The government hid the fact that the group was under surveillance of the country’s intelligence and law enforcement agencies starting in 2000 and that its leaders and members supported suicide terrorist attacks and al-Qaeda, targeted Christians and Jews, sent fighters abroad and illegally collected funds to support its operations.

 

Journalist Hidayet Karaca has been in a Turkish prison since 2014.

The government arguments to defend the imprisonment of journalist Karaca and whitewash the crimes of jihadist groups were made by Hacı Ali Açıkgül, head of the Human Rights Department at the Ministry of Justice, who told the Strasbourg court that the group was a victim and wrongfully prosecuted, indicted tried and convicted between 2010 and 2014.

The ECtHR found violations in the imprisonment of the journalist in three out of four complaints filed under Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). It unanimously ruled that the Turkish government violated Karaca’s rights by keeping him excessively and continuously in pretrial detention by means of rulings by courts that lack sufficient guarantees for their independence and impartiality.

However, it ruled with a majority that there was no violation in connection with the alleged lack of plausible reasons to suspect Karaca of having committed a criminal offense. Maltese judge Lorraine Schembri Orland dissented, saying there was no justifiable reason to detain the journalist. Norwegian judge Arnfinn Bårdsen, Macedonian judge Jovan Ilievski, Lithuanian judge Egidijus Kūris, Turkish judge Saadet Yüksel and Moldovan judge Diana Sarcu all went along with the Erdogan government’s defense.

There have been allegations that Turkish judge Yüksel and court registrar Hasan Bakırcı may have exerted influence in the favorable ruling for the Erdogan government in relation to the complaint filed under Article 5 § 1. It is believed that they downplayed the actions and views of the radical group regarding armed jihadist activity.

 

Mehmet Doğan (aka Mullah Muhammed el-Kesri), leader of the al-Qaeda-linked Tahşiyeciler terrorist group.

It is worth noting that Yüksel’s nomination to the ECtHR was made by the Erdogan government after the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) repeatedly rejected nominees presented by Turkey, which raises concerns about potential bias. Additionally, there have been frequent instances in which Yüksel has aligned her decisions with the stance of the Turkish government in cases involving human rights violations originating from Turkey.

The ECtHR ruling in favor of the Erdogan government can be seen as a partial victory for President Erdogan. It is worth noting that Erdogan began publicly defending the jihadist group in 2014, shortly after being implicated in significant corruption investigations that came to light in December 2013. These investigations revealed the close connections between Erdogan, his son Bilal Erdogan and Yasin al-Qadi, a Saudi national who was once listed as an al-Qaeda financier by both the US and the UN.

The campaign to save the indicted Mullah Muhammed was first launched by the Sabah daily, owned by Erdogan’s family, on March 13, 2014, when an article tried to portray him as a victim. The government claimed that Mullah Muhammed was framed by the Gülen movement, a group that is highly critical of Erdogan on a range of issues, from corruption to Turkey’s arming of jihadist groups in Syria and Libya.

Mullah Muhammed and his associates faced a crackdown in 2010 and were indicted on counterterrorism charges after the police concluded that the group, monitored since 2000 by law enforcement and intelligence agencies, was getting ready to conduct terrorist attacks. During the raids, police discovered three hand grenades, one smoke bomb, seven handguns, 18 hunting rifles, electronic parts for explosives, knives and a large cache of ammunition in the homes of the suspects.

 

Mustafa Kaplan (L) and Mehmet Doğan (aka Mollah Muhammed, Mullah Muhammed el-Kesri) seen at a private sermon on February 7, 2023.

Hundreds of wiretaps that were collected in the course of the investigation portray a picture that Tahşiyeciler operated as part of global al-Qaeda, raised funds and sent Turkish fighters to join the conflicts in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Police investigators concluded that “its activities to recruit to people to participate in terrorist acts in the so-called jihadi zone, the way it organizes itself, its purposes and acts which differ significantly from known terrorist organizations are considered to indicate that they are operating as part of the al-Qaeda terrorist organization.”

In seized taped recordings that were found during the execution of search warrants, Mullah Muhammed was heard calling for violent jihad: “I’m telling you to take up your guns and kill them,” he said. He also asked his followers to build bombs and mortar shells in their homes and urged the decapitation of Americans, claiming that Islam allows such practices. “If the sword is not used, then this is not Islam,” he stated.

According to Mullah Muhammed, all Muslims were obligated to respond to then-al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden’s armed fight. He reiterated his fondness for bin Laden in a live TV interview after his release.

Intercepted email messages also exposed possible hit lists compiled by Tahşiyeciler for future terrorist attacks. The group was interested in businesspeople from the Sabataycılar (a secret Jewish community that follows Sabbatai Sevi and pretends to be Muslim) and other groups. It even collected names from tombstones in the Bülbül Deresi Cemetery, where Jews were believed to have been buried.

The Turkish president’s lawyer, Mustafa Doğan İnal, defended Tahşiyeciler in court. İnal also represented al-Qadi, a close friend of Erdogan who for years was listed as an al-Qaeda financier by both the UN Security Council sanction committee and the US Treasury.

 

Mustafa Doğan İnal is the personal lawyer of Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan,

The Bakirköy 3rd High Criminal Court with a newly appointed panel of judges under a redesigned judiciary acquitted all suspects including Mullah Muhammed of al-Qaeda charges on December 15, 2015. Contrary to past actions, the Security General Directorate (Emniyet) also issued a new report whitewashing the activities of the group.

Mustafa Kaplan, a senior figure believed to be the successor of Mullah Muhammed in the Tahşiyeciler group and in charge of foreign operations, is another notorious figure. According to digital evidence seized in suspect Mehmet Sururi Kale’s home, several DVDs that had Kaplan’s recorded sermons from 2008 were found and logged in the evidentiary case file. In a DVD tagged No.1 that contains some of the speeches he delivered including ones in Germany, Kaplan was heard hailing fighters who leave their parents to fight in Chechnya, Afghanistan, Kashmir and Bosnia. He describes them as the real men who are fighting in these places and encourages Turks to go and join the fight rather than stay behind like a woman.

He claims jihadists who emerged in Chechnya, China’s Xinjiang region and Afghanistan are the harbingers of the Mahdi, a messianic deliverer prophesied by the Islamic Prophet. He anticipates that those fighters will one day come to Turkey to turn it into an Islamic state. Mahdi’s army will crush India and China first before setting its sights on Europe, according to Kaplan, who believes that a Muslim army with a black flag will emerge in Central Asia and establish an Islamic state. He lamented that Muslims established an Islamic state in Afghanistan but that the Americans destroyed it. “Not to worry,” he quickly added, stressing that now fighters will take over the whole world, not just Afghanistan, kill Jews and liberate Palestinian lands including Jerusalem.

 

Mustafa Kapalan was behind bars between 1993 and 1995 for his jihadist operations in Turkey.

Kaplan does not hide his passion for al-Qaeda, saying that the whole world is terrified of al-Qaeda even though the terrorist group has limited resources and capabilities. According to transcripts of his taped speeches, he stated that the entire world heard their voices when the call to prayer was sounded from the twin towers of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. He ridicules US troops for being afraid of teenagers in Iraq and says how the US troops are panicked by Muslim boys, stressing that it’s only death that could scare US soldiers. He brands the US as Dajjal, an evil figure in Islamic literature who is also called the anti-Christ. Kaplan makes a point that Muslims can neither have respect for Christians and Jews nor be befriended by them as they are infidels and should be killed wherever they are found.

According to the records, Kaplan was heard saying how drug, tobacco and alcohol-addicted Muslim boys would become heroes by leading the jihadist fight. He tells the tale of a drug-addicted Turkish boy from Istanbul’s Sefaköy district who went to Afghanistan, was trained in arms and engaged in heroic efforts afterwards. He often quotes his master Doğan as saying that the number-one job for Muslims is to establish an Islamic state based on theology. He went as far as claiming that Muslims can only save themselves by following the lead of Mullah Muhammed.

Some of Kaplan’s conversations in the seized DVDs apparently took place in Germany. As Kaplan talks to his comrades, he receives a phone call during which he tells the person on the other end that he is still in Germany. He says he would be in Bonn soon to give some talks. Ahlen, Dortmund and Anderten were mentioned in the phone conversation. He spews his hatred for Germany in these sermons, which he gave during a tour of German cities. For example, Kaplan said Germany would face the wrath of Muslims when it starts putting pressure on Turks and Muslims living in Germany. He promised that the Germans would soon regret sending troops to Afghanistan since fighters would come to Germany to punish them.

 

A disciple kisses hands of Mustafa Kaplan ®.

 

Apparently aiming to radicalize Turks in Germany, Kaplan mentions that Turks are hostages and prisoners in Germany because they have abandoned Islamic teachings. In the same speech he also says American soldiers have panic attacks when they see a 15-year-old Muslim boy in the streets of Iraq because young boys strap bombs to their bodies and blow themselves up, instilling fear in the hearts of infidels. He says a believer is not afraid of anybody and that killing oneself in a suicide bombing is better than living as a prisoner. He promises that heaven is waiting for those who martyr themselves, just like al-Qaeda’s twisted ideology. He makes a prediction that Muslims who are loathed today will soon take over Germany and France if they are really committed to their faith and act in line with God’s wishes. He says Berlin and New York will be battleground cities for violent clashes. At the end of this speech, he says he will be in Bonn to give further lectures.

Turkish journalist Karaca has been languishing behind bars since 2014 because the Erdogan government decided that he smeared this jihadist group with extremist views. In the meantime, both Mullah Muhammed and his deputy Kaplan are free to preach their venomous sermons and keep expanding their network in Turkey and Europe. The continued freedom of these radical individuals to propagate their poisonous sermons and expand their influence despite the imprisonment of a journalist who criticized them highlights the Erdogan government’s driving Islamist ideology, which is blatantly anti-Western.

 

Abdullah Bozkurt

abdullah.bozkurt@yahoo.com

https://nordicmonitor.com/2023/07/turkey-defended-pro-al-qaeda-jihadist-group-at-european-court-to-justify-jailing-of-a-journalist/

[Yervant1]

NordicMonitor.com

Turkish intelligence chief planned to raise political Islamist youths in Africa, secret wiretap reveals

by Abdullah Bozkurt

June 19, 2023

Turkey’s spymaster İbrahim Kalın.

Abdullah Bozkurt/Stockholm

A secret wiretap obtained by Nordic Monitor reveals how Turkey’s spy chief, İbrahim Kalın, contemplated a decades-long plan to raise a political Islamist generation on the African continent, using Turkish government influence and affiliated Islamist groups.

The wiretap, secured by a court order as part of an investigation into an organized crime network in which Kalın was one of the suspects, details a confidential conversation between Kalın and the late businessman Abdullah Tivnikli, a leading Islamist figure.

The communication, intercepted on January 14, 2013 at 13:08 hours and later incorporated into a criminal case, showed Kalın briefing the businessman on then-prime minister and now president Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visits to Gabon, Niger and Senegal as part of an Africa tour in January 2013. Kalın said he saw the schools as strategic assets that would be developed for the next 20 to 30 years.

During his time in Africa, Erdogan attended programs organized by Islamist schools run by the Aziz Mahmut Hudayi Foundation, a Turkish entity closely aligned with the Erdogan government. Tivnikli, who passed away in November 2018, was one of the founders of the organization. He was seeking a briefing on the phone about the visits to schools linked to Hudayi.

“It was quite interesting that he [Erdogan] visited only our schools,” Tivnikli told Kalın. “We have just started. For instance, I told [foundation staff] in Ghana that there are around 10,000 [students], like [MTTB] youths. … You should act,” Tivnikli said. “Good [projects] are being carried out, and more will be, Inshallah,” Kalın responded.

Wiretap that features the phone conversation of İbrahim Kalın with a known Islamist figure:

 

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The National Turkish Students Union (Millî Türk Talebe Birliği, MTTB), which promotes an Islamic state in Turkey, has played an important role in Turkey in the political education of Islamist youth, including the founders of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), among them Erdogan, 11th president Abdullah Gül and former speaker of the parliament İsmail Kahraman. According to his official biography, President Erdogan was actively involved with the MTTB during his high school and university years.

Kalın was deputy undersecretary of the Office of the Prime Ministry and chief foreign policy adviser to Erdogan at the time of the Africa tour. He later moved to Erdogan’s palace as spokesperson and chief advisor before becoming head of Turkey’s notorious intelligence organization MIT earlier this month.

In the wiretapped conversation Kalın and Tivnikli discuss seeking the support of African leaders during the second Turkey-Africa Partnership Summit in order to build new schools in their countries. The summit, which was scheduled for 2013 in Turkey, was postponed, and Erdogan and African leaders finally met in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea, November 19-21, 2014. A declaration and 2015-2019 Joint Implementation Plan were adopted at the summit.

“That is great, Brother. We should discuss those later. The Turkey-Africa [Partnership] Summit will be held here [in Turkey]. We will host all the African leaders,” Kalın told Tivnikli. “Sure. All of them are asking for money [to facilitate the founding of schools in their countries],” stated Tivnikli. “Brother, you should give [money] since you will profit from [the schools],” said Kalın.

The Turkish government not only uses Islamist groups to expand its reach and influence on the African continent but also established an official government foundation called Maarif by a special law in 2014 and handed over its management to known Islamists who harbor jihadist views. Every year the foundation receives huge sums of money from the central government budget. Maarif runs schools in 26 African countries and has plans to expand it to all 54 in the future.

 

İbrahim Kalın, the new chief of Turkish intelligence agency MIT.

The Erdogan government also tried to tap into the network of schools owned and operated by the Gülen movement, a group that is opposed to the government, but US-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gülen, who inspired the movement, said the movement rejected the government offer. Then Erdogan turned against the movement, established Maarif and took over some Gülen-linked schools in African countries using bribes, political influence and promises of trade, investment and arms sales.

Today Maarif operates in 67 countries and runs 446 schools and 36 dormitories with a student population of 50,699. In addition to this, Turkish government-backed Islamist groups also operate hundreds of their own schools on the continent to help promote the political Islamist ideology of the Erdogan government. In every election period, African students have been featured in Erdogan government campaigns, portraying Erdogan as a sort of caliph revered by many in Africa.

With a new position as head of the intelligence agency with abundant funding and countless resources at his disposal, Kalın is expected to give a further push to raising an Islamist generation on the continent to use for political objectives and perhaps to employ this human resource as an asset for collecting intelligence and engaging in espionage for the intelligence agency.

 

A map showing the location of Maarif schools in Africa.

Kalın is grateful to Erdogan for saving him from serious criminal troubles and will do his bidding with no questions asked. In 2013 both Tivnikli and Kalın were suspects in an organized crime network that was involved in fraud, forgery and abuse of power in fixing government contracts, tenders and public property sales. Kalin was acting as an illegal lobbyist for Tivnikli in the Turkish capital, resolving problems in energy deals the businessman pursued. In exchange Tivnikli covered the education expenses of Kalın’s daughter, Rumeysa Kalın (Karabulut). The investigation was made public on December 25, 2013, but Erdogan stepped in and killed the probe before it went to trial.

Rumeysa Kalın Karabulut previously worked as a law clerk at US law firm Saltzman & Evinch. The Wall Street Journal had reported that the Turkish government used Saltzman & Evinch to gather information about Erdogan critics living in the US. Since 2019 Karabulut has been working as a reporter for Turkey’s state-owned TRT World broadcasting network, a government mouthpiece.

In total 41 people, including Erdogan’s son Bilal and Saudi businessmen Yasin al-Qadi, at one-time designated under sanctions by the UN and US for alleged financing of terrorism, were named as suspects in the major corruption case.

 

 

https://nordicmonitor.com/2023/06/turkish-intelligence-chief-planned-to-raise-a-political-islamist-youth-in-africa-secret-wiretap-reveals/

[Yervant1]

NordicMonitor.com

Turkish parliament report fails to refer to ISIS, al-Qaeda as terrorist organizations

by Levent Kenez

March 24, 2023

Levent Kenez/Stockholm

The Turkish parliament’s Human Rights Committee published a report on Islamophobia and racism on March 9. Turkish lawmakers visited the United Kingdom, France, Germany and the Netherlands during the two-year preparation of the report, which includes such chapters as racism, the presence of Muslims and foreigners in Europe, the historical origin of Islamophobia in Europe, the reasons for its rise and the role of politics and media in the rise of racism. The report, which includes accusatory language targeting the Western world, calls European-based right-wing extremist groups “terrorist organizations” while referring to the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and al-Qaeda simply as “organizations.”

Stating that many acts alleged to have been carried out in the name of Islam fueled racism and Islamophobia in Europe, the report claims that the murder of 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics turned the opinion of Europeans, which until then had been positive, against the Palestinians and Muslims as well.

The report mentions al-Qaeda and ISIS as “some organizations” that cause Islamophobia.

“Islamophobia has turned into a state-sponsored movement,” the report states. “Islam and Muslims, as victims of an organized network, have been turned into objects of a lynching culture through a media industry based on lies. According to lawmakers, in countries such as France and Germany, all elements of the security sector, especially the law enforcement agency put state power at the service of anti-Muslim movements.

“The effects of the attacks carried out by organizations such as al-Qaeda and DAESH (ISIS) in Europe on the increase of Islamophobia and the formation of prejudices against Muslims in Europe cannot be denied. At this point, September 11, 2001 attacks in the US, the Madrid train station attack in 2004, the London attack in 2005, the 2015 Charlie Hebdo attack, the 2015 Paris attacks and the 2016 Belgian airport attack are among the biggest reasons for the increase of Islamophobia in the West because with these attacks, the perception that Islam is a religion that does not exclude violence has been created,” the report reads.

The report, which describes far-right organizations such as the German-based Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West (PEGIDA) as terrorist organizations, does not make similar references to ISIS or al-Qaeda.

Parliamentary committee chair Hakan Çavuşoğlu argued that violent acts against Muslims were organized but added that they have generally been considered individual crimes and covered up by the European authorities.

Ruling party lawmaker and committee member Osman Nuri Gülaçar claimed that Islamophobia is entirely of Western origin and was invented to prevent the spread of Islam. Gülacar, who asserted that between 170,000 and 190,000 people a year converted to Islam in the US before the September 11 attacks in 2001, said Islam was deliberately presented by the West as a threat.

The report includes serious accusations against the French and German governments, with French President Emanuel Macron in particular accused of trying to dilute the basic teachings of Islam by creating “French Islam.”

The report also states that the far-right Gray Wolves were discriminated against in France because they were Turkish. In 2020 France banned the group, which is linked to a key ally of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and is seen as the extremist wing of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), a staunch supporter of the Erdoğan government.

Erdoğan often refers to the fight against Islamophobia, telling his followers that European governments discriminate against Turkey because of its Muslim identity,

Erdoğan on February 25, 2022 wanted members of the Union of International Democrats (UID), his ruling party’s organization in Europe, to be united in the fight against Islamophobia and urged them to help other non-Turkish Muslims.

Turkish parliament’s report on Islamophobia and racism:

[see web page for image]

https://nordicmonitor.com/2023/03/turkish-parliamentary-report-hesitates-to-call-isis-and-al-qaeda-terrorist-organizations/

[Yervant1]

EurasianTimes.com

Erdogan’s ‘Disruptive’ Policies On Russia, China, Iran & Syria Frustrates The West; Will Turkey Be Ejected From NATO?

EuropeExpert Reviews

By Prakash Nanda

July 2, 2023

The discretion of the Holy Quran in Sweden by a group of protestors on June 29 could greatly impact Stockholm’s plan to join NATO as its 32nd member. It looks unlikely that Turkey, which is allegedly getting increasingly Islamized and has an unsavory image of being a “fickle ally,” will remove its objection to Sweden being allowed as a NATO member so easily.

In the process, the issue of Sweden’s membership at the forthcoming NATO summit, set for July 11-12 in the Latvian capital Riga, may require harder efforts toward an amicable resolution.

It may be noted that Turkey ratified, not without reluctance, though, Finland’s NATO accession in March. But it continues to raise objections to Sweden’s membership. It alleges that Stockholm supports Kurdish militants, namely the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party), which Ankara deems a terrorist organization.

Though Sweden has amended its anti-terror laws, Turkey is not convinced that Sweden, a democratic country with an independent judiciary, cannot prevent peaceful demonstrations and curtail freedom of _expression_.

“Turkey maintains its constructive stance regarding Sweden’s membership but that legislative amendments would be meaningless so long as PKK/PYD/YPG supporters organize demonstrations freely in this country,” said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan reportedly last week to NATO’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.

It may be noted that Turkey is one of the oldest members of NATO. Its accession to the Western alliance was way back in 1952. But over the recent years, particularly after Erdogan assumed office, Turkey is now considered the “most isolated” in NATO.

Let alone the accession of first Finland and now Sweden, Turkey has had differences with many NATO objectives and principles. Turkey is reported to be not in consonance with a new “defense strategy,” said to be the most ambitious overhaul to be drafted since the end of the Cold War.

This strategy, drafted in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, is supposed to be given the green light by the leaders during the forthcoming NATO summit in two weeks.

The details of the draft have not been made public. However, it is understood that it comprises secret “regional plans” running into thousands of pages that propose in detail how the alliance would respond to a Russian attack. It is viewed as a “fundamental shift” as NATO needs large-scale defense plans. For decades, it has fought smaller wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; it has not faced a big war.

However, in their meeting in Brussels on June 15, NATO defense ministers failed to agree on new plans for how the alliance would respond to a Russian attack. According to Reuters, Turkey was the one that blocked the move.

Quoting an unnamed diplomat, the Reuters report said that Turkey blocked approval over the wording of geographical locations, including concerning Cyprus.

Other reports suggest that Turkey wants the draft text to refer to critical waterways connecting the Black Sea to the Aegean as the “Turkish Straits” rather than the “Straits.”

It may be noted here that the 1936 Montreux Convention, which regulates maritime traffic through the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits and the Sea of Marmara that lies between them, refers to them simply as the “Straits.” Using the term “Turkish Straits” could have legal implications that would give Turkey greater control over the bodies of water than it currently enjoys under Montreux. In ways that could undermine Western interests, it is feared. Greece, another NATO member, will never agree to the Turkish demand.

The Dardanelles and Bosporus Passages

As it is, Turkey has a dispute over maritime rights with Greece. It threatens to attack Greece, though both are NATO members. “We may suddenly come one night,” Erdogan warned not long ago, suggesting a Turkish operation against one of the Greek islands that hug Turkey’s southern and western coast. He has even hinted that Turkey can strike Athens with ballistic missiles.

Turkey and Greece, or for that matter, the European Union (EU), also have differences over the status of Cyprus. The island in the eastern Mediterranean has remained divided since 1974 between the internationally recognized Greek Cypriot administration and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, protected by Turkish troops and recognized solely by Ankara.

Cyprus is a member of the EU, but Turkey has blocked its membership in NATO and refuses to acknowledge its legitimacy. Cyprus, in turn, has blocked Turkey’s move to become a member of the EU (membership in both the EU and NATO depends on the consensus of all who are already members).

Tensions between Turkey and Cyprus have been further heightened over exploration and production rights for natural gas in the eastern Mediterranean.

Turkey has also quarreled with France. Last year, the French frigate, the Courbet, had tried to stop Turkish arms smuggling to Libya. Besides, Erdogan had called for a boycott of French products after French President Emmanuel Macron firmly upheld the right of cartoonists to depict religious figures.

In fact, in 2009, the Turkish President blocked the appointment of a new NATO chief from Denmark because the country was too tolerant of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad and too sympathetic to “Kurdish terrorists.” Erdogan relented on Dane’s appointment when the then US President Barack Obama promised that NATO would appoint a Turk to a leadership position.

Many argue that Turkey is increasingly “a disruptive ally” within NATO. Despite warnings from fellow NATO members in general and the US in particular, Erdogan went ahead with purchasing an S-400 air-defense system from Russia.

The US canceled the proposed sale of F-35 fighters to Turkey in retaliation. The US and fellow NATO members had a point that Buying the Russian S-400 would complicate their integrated defense systems.

Turkey is following an autonomous policy, quite different from that of NATO in general, regarding its relations with Russia. Turkey has sided with or benefitted greatly in managing the Kurd rebels from Russian intervention in Russia. The buffer zones Turkey has created in Syria’s north would not have been possible without Russian approval.

Besides, in 2019 Erdogan mounted a military incursion to battle Kurds in northern Syria who were aiding the fight against the Islamic State with US support.

As the Economist magazine says, “From the war in Ukraine to those in Syria and Nagorno-Karabakh, to relations with China, to sanctions against Iran, to press freedoms, human rights, and terrorism, the list of issues where Turkey and its Western allies no longer see eye to eye is long.

“The institutional links, including membership in NATO and the Council of Europe and the customs union with the EU, are intact. But in policies, a decoupling is underway. In 2008 Turkey aligned itself with 88% of the EU’s foreign-policy decisions and declarations. By 2016 that share had fallen by half to 44%. Last year it was only 7%.”

So much so that Doug Bandow, a Senior Fellow at Cato Institute, has argued that “The US and the rest of NATO should stop catering to Turkey. If the alliance is serious, it should insist on members’ loyalty to other members and their willingness to join collective action against a presumed antagonist. If a government’s behavior significantly diverges from the alliance’s objectives, other members should consider ousting that state—and forging more realistic cooperative arrangements for the future.”

Similarly, in an opinion piece in Wall Street Journal, Joseph I Lieberman, a former independent US senator from Connecticut, and Mark D Wallace, the chief executive of the Turkish Democracy Project, have argued that the alliance (NATO) should explore ways of ejecting Turkey.

“Turkey is a member of NATO, but under Mr. Erdogan, it no longer subscribes to the values that underpin this great alliance,” they wrote.

Even some leading US politicians like Senator Bob Menendez of New Jersey, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has said that “Turkey under Erdogan should not and cannot be seen as an ally.”

However, expelling Turkey from NATO is not an easy option. Turkey gives NATO a crucial strategic position at the intersection of Europe and Asia, astride the Middle East and the Black Sea. It hosts a major US air base where American nuclear weapons are stored. Turkey is the NATO country with the second largest number of military personnel after the United States.

Erdogan has been quite friendly with Russian President Vladimir Putin, now NATO’s number one enemy. He continues with Turkey’s business dealings with Russia and refuses to align with Western sanctions. But it is also a fact that Erdogan blocked Russian warships headed toward Ukraine. He forced Russia to lift the naval blockade of Ukraine, allowing it to export its agricultural products. It is he who negotiated prisoner swaps with Russia. He takes credit for giving a besieged Ukraine the drones that helped save Kyiv.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan (Twitter)

And it is Erdogan who could be an effective mediator between the West and Russia to end the war in Ukraine if any possibility of a negotiated peace arises.

Viewed thus, the marriage between Turkey and the West may be unhappy, but it has not reached the level of a final break-up. There are optimists within NATO, like Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, who think that, ultimately, Turkey would not do anything that hurt either Europe or the United States.

After all, the EU is Turkey’s main trade partner and source of foreign investment. And America happens to be Turkey’s biggest supplier of weapons. So Erdogan will ultimately agree to the accession of Sweden to NATO, it is argued.

Be that as it may, things will become clearer at the forthcoming NATO summit next fortnight.

• Author and veteran journalist Prakash Nanda is Chairman of the Editorial Board – EurAsian Times and has been commenting on politics, foreign policy, on strategic affairs for nearly three decades. A former National Fellow of the Indian Council for Historical Research and recipient of the Seoul Peace Prize Scholarship, he is also a Distinguished Fellow at the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies.
• CONTACT: prakash.nanda (at) hotmail.com

 

https://eurasiantimes.com/new-frustrates-us-why-is-nato-tolerating-a-highly-disruptive/

[Yervant1]

BalkanInsight.com

CoE: Turkey Using Sweden’s NATO Membership Bid To Extend Repression

Hamdi Firat Buyuk

Sarajevo

BIRN

June 23, 202314:57

Council of Europe report says Turkey's government uses many tactics to repress its critics abroad - and they include blocking Sweden's NATO membership bid.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (right) and Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson attend a press conference after their meeting in Ankara, 8 November 2022. Photo: EPA-EFE/NECATI SAVAS

The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe’s latest report, “Transnational repression as a growing threat to the rule of law and human rights”, says Turkey employs various strategies to hound its critics abroad, including an attempt to trap Sweden over its NATO membership bid.

“The Assembly specifically calls upon Turkey to end its intimidation of Bulent Kenes, to recognise and respect the decision of the Swedish Supreme Court and curtail its policy of using its veto on Sweden’s membership to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) as a tool of transnational repression,” the report written by Christopher Chope, a British member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, PACE, said.

Kenes was a former editor-in-chief of Today’s Zaman newspaper in Turkey, a paper affiliated with exiled government critic Fethullah Gulen. Following a failed coup attempt in Turkey in 2016, Kenes, like tens of thousands of others, found refuge abroad in Sweden, obtaining political asylum there.

Gulen, a Muslim preacher living in the US, denies any connection with the coup attempt but Ankara defines his network as the “Fethullahist Terrorist Organisation”, or FETO for short, a classification Western countries do not accept.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government recently pushed Sweden to extradite political refuges including Kenes in return of its approval for its NATO membership bid.

Despite all calls and warnings, Erdogan still has not approved Sweden’s membership bid amidst Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine.

“This behaviour is unacceptable to all those who support the rule of law and serves as an example of the type of pressure which some countries seek to exercise over others to pursue what is essentially another aspect of transnational repression. Even prior to the Turkish Government’s statement a pro-government newspaper had revealed Mr Kenes’s home address and published secretly taken photos in November 2022. Bulent Kenes is one of the founders of the Stockholm Centre for Freedom,” the report added.

Emre Turkut, a postdoctoral researcher at the Hertie School’s Centre for Fundamental Rights in Berlin, said the West should be prepared for autocrats’ unprincipled tactics.

“Erdogan’s pursuit of political interests that undermine human rights in return for Sweden’s NATO membership shows that the right plans must be made against authoritarian regimes. Authoritarian regimes do not have principles. Turkey has already lost its consciousness of being a democratic state that respects human rights,” Turkut told BIRN.

While the CoE report calls on Turkey to stop using Sweden’s NATO membership in its international repression, Turkish members of the PACE objected to the link being made.

“Sweden’s NATO membership is not related to the report. Negotiations for Sweden’s membership continues on the basis of a trilateral memorandum signed by Turkey, Sweden and Finland. Negotiations for Finland’s membership were successfully finalised. Sweden’s membership is expected to be concluded successfully in the near future,” Turkish parliamentarians from Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development party, AKP, wrote.

Various tactics to hound critics abroadFormer editor-in-chief of the Turkish daily ‘Cumhuriyet’, Can Dundar, in Berlin, Germany, 28 September 2018. Photo: EPA-EFE/CLEMENS BILAN

Turkey’s strategy to use NATO membership issues forms only part of Erdogan’s government’s campaign to repress critics abroad.

“Reportedly, the number of incidents of physical transnational repression committed since 2014 reached 854 by the end of 2022. These acts were committed by 38 governments in 91 countries around the world. The most prolific perpetrators of transnational repression are, according to the non-governmental organisation Freedom House, the governments of China, Turkey, Russian Federation, Egypt and Tajikistan,” the report added.

Other tactics of Turkey listed by the report include manipulation of Interpol’s red notice system, manipulation of counter-terrorism financing mechanisms as well as renditions.

“The Turkish campaign has been found to rely on renditions, abuse of extradition proceedings, Interpol Red Notices and anti-terror financing measures, and co-opting other States to deport or transfer persons unlawfully,” the report noted, using examples of Kosovo and Moldova from which Turkey brought several Turkish citizens who are alleged members of Gulen’s network.

Turkut said transnational repression is nothing new for Turkey.

“The government has been using different transnational repression tools especially since the 1990s. After 2015, it became a very common systematic,” Turkut said, underlying Turkey’s backward trend in democracy, the rule of law and human rights.

According to Turkut, Turkey uses three major tactics in its transnational repression.

“First, by signing anti-terrorism agreements or security cooperation agreements with the countries it was able to … create… a legal infrastructure for the extradition of wanted dissidents. Secondly, in countries that are usually democratic countries, where this infrastructure could not be provided, legal applications were made for the extradition of the dissidents, and these applications were rejected in many countries such as the UK, the US and Belgium,” Turkut said.

Turkut said the third tactic includes various forms.

“Turkey has used various strategies to conduct a massive transnational repression across borders to supress dissidents. These include passport cancellations, Interpol notices, forced abductions and similar. All of these are fundamentally against human rights,” Turkut added.

According to a Freedom House, quoted by the report, Turkey has so far rendered 58 people including alleged Gulenists, Kurdish fugitives and other critics from 17 countries.

Turkish journalists who live abroad are also specifically hunted by the Turkish government.

“NGOs have also highlighted the role of the Turkish intelligence agency in threats and intimidation of Turkish opposition members and journalists in exile and called on States to prevent any co-operation with the Turkish secret service,” the report underlined, citing the case of a senior Turkish journalist, Can Dundar.

Dundar, then editor-in-chief of the daily Cumhuriyet, left for Germany in June 2016 after being sentenced to prison for leaking national security information.

“Since going into exile, he has faced numerous threats. He and other Turkish journalists in Germany have received protection from German authorities,” the report added.

 

 

https://balkaninsight.com/2023/06/23/coe-turkey-using-swedens-nato-membership-bid-to-extend-repression/

[Yervant1]

ekathimerini.com

Turkish games in the Straits

[AP]

Stavros Tzimas

02.07.2023 • 23:53

Turkey is seeking to pack as much as it can into the agenda of the crucial NATO Summit in Vilnius in July. It is not just the trade-offs Ankara hopes to get for agreeing to Sweden’s induction into the Alliance or its claims concerning the Turkish-occupied north of Cyprus.

According to the usually well-informed AI-Monitor, Ankara is also planning to demand that the Straits – as foreseen under the 1936 Montreaux Convention – which connect the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, be renamed the “Turkish Straits.” You don’t need to be a geopolitics expert to understand that Ankara is seeking control over the entry and exit points of the Bosporus and Black Sea, with everything this entails for maritime trade and military movements in the area.

The allies will not be eager to hand over the keys to Turkey when the situation in the Black Sea is as stormy as it is due to the war in Ukraine, Russia’s expansive ambitions and the increasingly close ties between Moscow and Ankara. Giving Turkey control of the Straits – and through them, Russia – would be suicide for Western interests in Southeast Europe and the Caucasus. It would raise the risk of the Black Sea becoming a “lake” of Turco-Russian interests and of the countries near its shores having to submit to them. But NATO’s reluctance to shoot itself in the foot means that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will likely leverage the issue to negotiate some other of his many demands with the Alliance.

Either way, the issue of the Straits’ status will have made it onto the international agenda. It is imperative, therefore – and not just for Greece – to create an overland corridor via Alexandroupoli to the Black Sea’s shores and further into the Baltics, bypassing the Straits.

 

 

https://www.ekathimerini.com/opinion/1214391/turkish-games-in-the-straits/

[MosJan]

[MosJan]

[MosJan]

[MosJan]

[MosJan]

his got something from somone, he wont just do something. in this case EU membership in one

[Yervant1]

Armenpress.am

Turkey still has resources to resort to deceptive maneuvering actions between Russia and the West - Turkologist

10:19, 12 July 2023

YEREVAN, 11 JULY, ARMENPRESS. At this moment, we are witnessing the emphatic diplomatic behavior of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the last years of his tenure. Turkey is either getting closer to Russia or a little closer to the West. This is also characteristic of Turkey's comprehensive foreign policy of the last period. They conduct this policy with the intention that Ankara will get the dividends it seeks for a long time.

In an interview with ARMENPRESS, Ruben Safrastyan, Turkologist-academic, Counselor of Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the National Academy of Sciences of Armenia, expressed said this, referring to the changes in the relations between Turkey and the West.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg announced that Turkey agreed to confirm Sweden's membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and Turkish media noted that after that the Turkish government received full support from the West in lifting sanctions and liberalizing the visa regime.

"The supply of modernized American F-16 aircraft is also extremely important for Turkey. That issue was raised again two days ago during a telephone conversation with US President Joe Biden organized by Erdogan's initiative, and probably the Turkish leader received certain promises. The financial and economic support of the West is certainly important for Turkey, especially since after the devastating earthquake, the Turkish economy and especially the financial system is in a very difficult condition," Safrastyan said.

According to him, the situation of Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan has major role in that matter. It should not be forgotten that he received higher education and has experience in the USA and has been involved in the works carried out with NATO for many years. Fidan has a more pro-Western mentality, in contrast to Çavuşoğlu, and represents the circle of the Turkish political elite that is more pro-American.

According to Safrastyan, Ankara once again raised the issue of EU membership, especially since the process has been suspended by the EU in recent years. If Turkey supports Sweden in becoming a member of NATO, the latter has promised to support Turkey in European integration, although it is a rather difficult and long process. Regardless of everything, Erdogan is trying to turn the situation to its advantage in return for once again showing reverence to the West and realizing his long-standing goals.

Safrastyan reflected on the statement of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, according to which Sweden's membership in NATO cannot be connected with Turkey's European integration, and emphasized that the EU will never allow this issue to become a subject of negotiation.

"This problem is related to fundamental phenomena. The EU has set demands for Turkey, and only after fulfilling them, the latter can become a member of the European Union, while Ankara has no intention of fulfilling those demands. The demands include the protection of human rights in that country, the repressions that still exist, therefore, at this stage, Erdogan's purpose to join the European Union is not serious, it is just a part of a big plan. "The Turks understand that it is not possible to become EU member by non-fulfillment of demands. The contradictions are very deep," said the Turkologist-academic.

Speaking about the Turkish mediation efforts in the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, Safrastyan said that although Turkey, violating the agreement with Moscow, returned 5 commanders of the "Azov" battalion to Ukraine with Vladimir Zelensky, who had visited Turkey, however, even that step should not be considered as a sharp turn of policy towards Russia.

"That is also calculated. Ankara and Moscow understand very well that the current level of relations is of great benefit to the parties. Turkey does not join the sanctions against Russia, taking into account the implementation of large joint projects in various areas. Even in case of demarches and tough position from Moscow, the two countries will not abandon a very high level of interaction. On the other hand, Turkey has resources to resort to deceptive maneuvering actions between Russia and the West, despite the fact that its range is relatively small. The reason is that Turkey is strategically an inseparable part of the West, an ally of the USA and a loyal member of NATO," explained Safrastyan.

He did not exclude the point of view circulating among experts that the above-mentioned political course of Ankara with its expected new manifestations may gradually cause problems in relations with Moscow, which will have a certain impact on the situation in the South Caucasus.

"Judging from the current stage of the processes, it can be concluded that in our region there may be a certain hardening of Russia's positions towards the Turkish-Azerbaijani duo. But this will not lead to big changes or drastic shifts in Russian policy towards Turkey. As for the Armenian-Turkish relations, Ankara definitely connects this process with the settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict and here Ankara will never change its attitude towards Armenia. If the Armenian side agrees to the maximalist demands of Azerbaijan, on the basis of which some agreement will be signed, then Turkey will take some positive steps, but not complete. Otherwise, it is not worth expecting anything from Ankara," concluded the Turkologist.

Manvel Margaryan

 

 

https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1115223.html?fbclid=IwAR2kdN2R1Nxjsq2Lqv1Tpvu6L-U2_wT7vGedI80a3LN6CFkvKdfekitR4Zg

[Yervant1]

Asbarez.com

Turkish Consul General to L.A. Lobbies Elected Officials to Ignore Armenian-American Concerns

by Contributor

July 17, 2023

in Armenia, Artsakh, Community, Featured Story, Latest, News, Top Stories

Turkish Consul General to Los Angeles, Sinan Kuzum, in June, disseminated a letter to California lawmakers in an attempt to highlight “positive developments in the Turkish and Armenian relationship,” referring to the ongoing negotiations between Armenia and Turkey, and the participation of Armenia’s Prime Minister in the inauguration of Turkey’s President.

In his inflammatory letter, Kuzum accused the Armenian Diaspora in Los Angeles of attempting to hamper the goodwill and spirit of peaceful negotiations between Armenia and Turkey, urging lawmakers to be mindful of the ongoing negotiations before they speak on matters concerning Armenian-Turkish relations.

 

The Turkish Consul General’s letter is just the latest example of the Turkish government’s efforts to silence the Armenian diaspora’s voice and effectiveness in advocating for a just US foreign policy in the region. Furthermore, the consul general’s letter is indicative of a larger problem that should be of grave concern to Americans and policymakers alike–a foreign principal actively engaged in efforts to bend local, state, and federal policymakers to the will of a foreign country, in direct conflict with their constituents’ interests and needs.

 

The Armenian National Committee of America – Western Region responded to the Turkish Consul General’s letter, condemning their deception and distortion of facts. The Turkish government has a long history of denying the Armenian Genocide and, more recently, supplied Azerbaijan with weaponry and personnel during the 2020 Artsakh War.

 

“The Turkish Consul General’s letter is a desperate attempt to deflect attention away from the Turkish government’s own obstructionism on the path to normalization of relations,” said ANCA – Western Region Board Chair Nora Hovsepian Esq.

“Whitewashing its history of genocide and human rights violations is nothing new for Turkey. We will continue to hold the Turkish government accountable until it fulfills its historical obligations to the Armenian people. The Armenian diaspora will not be silenced, and we will continue to fight for justice for the Armenian Genocide and the crimes Turkey has been actively committing against Armenia, Artsakh, and the Diaspora as a whole. We trust that our elected officials will continue to prioritize the concerns of their own Armenian-American constituents over the shameless lobbying of a foreign government trying to dismiss those legitimate concerns,” added Hovsepian.

The Armenian National Committee of America Western Region is the largest and most influential Armenian-American grassroots advocacy organization in the Western United States. Working in coordination with a network of offices, chapters, and supporters throughout the Western United States and affiliated organizations around the country, the ANCA-WR advances the concerns of the Armenian American community on a broad range of issues.

https://asbarez.com/turkish-consul-general-to-l-a-lobbies-elected-officials-to-ignore-armenian-american-concerns/?fbclid=IwAR3uHQKSCKrpP3lmyG11h4Czgm7m9197k8bwUoTrL_2ZrcnWfPqtjJ5yZOg

[Yervant1]

July 17 2023

Erdogan’s foul play: Turkey is teaming up with Azerbaijan to punish Armenia

By Sam Brownback and Michael Rubin - - Monday, July 17, 2023

OPINION:

As President Recep Tayyip Erdogan begins his third decade in power, he has solidified his place as Turkey’s second-most consequential leader after Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, who founded the republic a century ago.

With the opposition disempowered if not in disarray, Mr. Erdogan now seeks to fulfill his lifelong ambition: the complete and permanent reversal of Ataturk’s legacy of modern reforms.

American and European officials who believe, with the election in the rearview mirror, that they can return to business as usual with Turkey are dangerously mistaken. The issues that concern Mr. Erdogan most are neither interest rates at home nor Swedish NATO accession abroad, but rather laying the groundwork for the renewal of an Islamic state if not formal caliphate.

Just as Russian President Vladimir Putin considers the downfall of the Soviet Union the 20th century’s greatest “geopolitical catastrophe,” Mr. Erdogan believes it was the Ottoman Empire’s collapse.

None of this is idle speculation. Mr. Erdogan has said exactly what he wants.

He has described himself as the “imam of Istanbul” and as “servant of Sharia.” He declared that his goal is “to raise a religious generation.” He has described Turkish forces invading Syria as the “Army of Muhammad.” The reconversion of the Hagia Sophia into a mosque did not occur in isolation.

The latest foul play by Mr. Erdogan involves Armenia, the world’s oldest Christian nation. As Mr. Erdogan seeks to extend the reach of the Turkic and Islamic world from Turkey’s border with Greece and Bulgaria to China, Armenia, a country just slightly larger than Maryland, stands in his way.

Today, Mr. Erdogan believes he has found his moment to reverse this geopolitical inconvenience. The Turks tried more than a century ago, wiping away more than a million Armenians in a genocide Adolf Hitler cited as an inspiration for the Holocaust.

Armenians say it was no coincidence that Turkey’s chief ally, Azerbaijan, used Turkish-piloted, U.S.-provided F-16s while operating alongside Turkish special forces to launch a surprise attack in September 2020 on the Armenian-populated enclave Nagorno-Karabakh.

The attack came on the 100th anniversary of the Ottoman invasion of newly independent Armenia.

That the two countries act in conjunction is no surprise. Both leaders often describe their relationship as “one nation, two states.” Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev today is to Mr. Erdogan what Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko is to Mr. Putin. Mr. Aliyev is essentially Mr. Erdogan’s Mini-Me.

Today, Russia plays a cynical game. Traditionally, it guaranteed Armenia’s security. But in 2018, Armenia committed what Mr. Putin considers an unforgivable sin: choosing democracy. Today, Mr. Putin sides with Messrs. Erdogan and Aliyev to punish Armenia’s transgression.

The situation now comes to a head. As the Biden administration seeks to negotiate peace between Azerbaijan and Armenia, Mr. Aliyev demands the 120,000 Christians of Nagorno-Karabakh become sacrificial lambs.

Azerbaijan has blocked the Lachin Corridor that allows the free flow of aid and people in and out of the Christian enclave. Russia had been the guarantor, but now it looks away.

Messrs. Erdogan and Aliyev are sophisticated. Genocide occurs best in the dark, so he bans journalists and diplomats from Nagorno-Karabakh, so that his propaganda need not confront truth.

After the Holocaust, the world said, “Never again.” Fifty years later, after the slaughter of Bosnian Muslims at Srebrenica despite supposed international protection, diplomats swore again, “Never again.”

Today, Nagorno-Karabakh’s regional capital, Stepanakert, is becoming the new Srebrenica. The region’s Christians need action, not empty rhetoric.

The Biden administration seeks to broker peace, but lasting peace rests on values. If democracy will triumph and Nagorno-Karabakh Christians are to survive on land they have lived on for millenniums, the West needs more than words.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/jul/17/erdogans-foul-play-turkey-is-teaming-up-with-azerb/