WHETHER the coup begun late Friday night in Turkey succeeds or not — it actually failed — the world may be starting to witness the slow unraveling of Turkey in a way that will trouble the restive region and ruffle the feathers of the world. With the ISIS campaign underway and proving testier than ever, the recrudescence of Kurdish separatism unsettling a significant part of the country, and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan sustaining his autocratic and polarising hold on the country, Turkey is unlikely to overcome its divisiveness for a long to come. The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO), of which Turkey is a member, will hope that the situation will normalise very quickly. Russia, whose Black Sea Fleet passes through the Bosphorus chokepoint, will also watch anxiously, hoping the situation does not deteriorate further. Turks themselves, who have become enamoured of their democracy, though sorely tested by President Erdogan’s unorthodox and repressive behaviour, would certainly hope that their country is not being torn asunder.
Except something positive and dramatic happens, the chances of the coup succeeding are not too bright. The coup itself is a consequence of the lack of restraint and poor judgement of President Erdogan. Yet, if the coup succeeds, and considering that he recorded nearly 50 percent of the votes in the last election, the country’s division may harden rather than soften. The ongoing struggle between secularism, democracy and constitutionalism on the one hand, which the military purports to safeguard, and the insidious shift towards religious intrusion in the polity on the other hand may also worsen. The shift towards more religious influence may as a result slow down considerably. But the wounds will not heal very quickly.
But if the coup fails, President Erdogan is likely to take more hardline stance against the military, especially in support of his long-running effort to strip the military of any political influence, and the crackdown on the military begun many years ago when the government orchestrated a phantom coup and used it as pretext to jail many top military commanders. Win or lose, therefore, this coup will change Turkish society for a very long time, and almost certainly worsen the country’s security situation in more ways than political leaders imagine. And win or lose, also, Mr Erdogan’s impetuous methods are not likely to win him more friends or strengthen the country against internal and external revolt. Are other countries facing similar conflicts and societal stratification and ossification along secular and theocratic lines learning anything at all from the Turkish problem?
Tag: Turkey
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The fracturing of Turkey
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Turkey military coup bid fails, 62 killed
The attempted coup in Turkey on Friday by the country’s military may have failed following the massive response of the citizens to the call by President Tayyip Erdogan to take to the streets and support him.
Erdogan, who had been holidaying on the southwest coast of the country when the coup was launched by a faction in the armed forces, flew into the capital, Istanbul before dawn on Saturday and was shown on TV appearing among a crowd of supporters outside Ataturk Airport.
However sixty-two people, including seventeen police officers, have been reported killed in the Ankara during the attempted coup according to a senior Turkish official.
Turkey’s military said on Friday that it had seized power, but the prime minister said the attempted coup would be put down.
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Military take over in Turkey
The Turkish military on Friday said that it had assumed power over Turkey, in what the prime minister has termed an illegal act.
“The power in the country has been seized in its entirety,” said a military statement read on NTV television, without giving further details. The military‘s website was not immediately accessible.
The Turkish military had earlier said that it had launched a coup on Friday.
Soldiers were seen on the streets in Istanbul and Ankara as jets flew low overhead, while ordinary citizens rushed for the safety of their homes after witnessing the coup attempt.
“The power in the country has been seized in its entirety,” said a militarystatement quoted by Turkish media.
It said the move had been made “in order to ensure and restore constitutional order, democracy, human rights and freedoms and let the supremacy law in the country prevail, to restore order which was disrupted.”
“All our international agreements and commitments retain their validity. We hope our good relations will continue with all countries in the world.”
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Turkey: Time the world intervened
In composing his famous tripartite epic poem, The Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri included in the first part called Inferno, what has since become one of the most meaningful quotes of all time, emphasising that “the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of moral crisis preserve their neutrality.” The quote was made more popular by late American President J.F. Kennedy, who aptly used it very often in 50s and 60s.
Perhaps more than anything else, the two major things that happened in quick succession last week, namely the misclassification of the Gulen-inspired Hizmet (Service) Movement by Turkish President Erdogan as a terrorist group, as well as the sentencing of former beauty queen, Miss Turkey for the ridiculous offence of “insulting” Erdogan, should serve as a final warning to the civilised world that this man it keeps tolerating, mainly because he is a NATO member and his country holds a major key to resolving the European refugee crisis, has since become a loose cannon, a major threat to world peace, freedom, liberty and everything all sane societies hold in awe.
For those who may not know, the Hizmet Movement, a group dedicated to rendering selfless service, providing critical aids and emergency interventions, as well as killing of ignorance, and President Erdogan were best of friends. In fact, members of the group helped bring him to power. However, Hizmetrealised that the man they innocently thought was going to serve Turkey selflessly and honestly, was fast becoming something else. Seeing Ankara becoming more and more enmeshed in corruption, and knowing the bitter ills of that cankerworm and how it inhibits societal growth, the independent media in Turkey launched an intensive investigative reporting that uncovered large-scale fraud and corruption involving some members of Erdogan’s government and immediate family, with the first such reports published on December 17, 2013.
Since then, Turkey has hardly known peace. Instead of addressing the message by stopping the widespread corruption, Erdogan blamed the media investigation on Hizmet Movement and started labelling them with all sorts of names. He swooped on all businesses and investments that have even one Hizmet member as owner or co-owner, closing down newspapers (including the famous Zaman newspaper that was publishing more than a million copies, daily), broadcast houses, banks, etc, using the flimsiest pretext. He also embarked on dangerous propaganda aimed at rubbishing the Hizmet Movement, and when he realised he was not making much headway in Turkey, Erdogan strangely decided to export his hate campaign abroad. Going from one country to another, he kept asking presidents and parliaments to close down schools, hospitals and other foreign investments he suspects to be Hizmet affiliated.
If Hizmet were a terrorist organisation as being wickedly bandied about by the Turkish President, the nationals of these countries having Hizmet-inspired schools should know because the children attending the institutions are their own. A terrorist organisation should never be at the forefront of clear efforts at killing ignorance, or set up schools and run them in full concert with approved curriculum of their host country, and in a most transparent manner. Also, you cannot call an institution a terrorist school when after several years since its establishment, not even one of their products or graduates has engaged in crime or terrorism. All over the world, students that passed through Hizmet-inspired schools are at the frontline of contributing to the growth and well-being of their societies.
It also amounts to an insult on the intelligence services and citizens of these host countries for Erdogan to think that on their own, they don’t have the wherewithal to differentiate light from darkness. And because no one can fool people all the time, Erdogan keeps deservedly getting the cold shoulder from these countries, with the citizens and their leaders angry that he is importing his dirty, shamelessly-desperate politics to their sane climes.
However, now that instead of toeing the path of decency and reason, Erdogan is even digging deeper in his trenches, the civilised world must rise beyond rhetoric to tame the Turkish President. To be fair to the rest of the world, a lot of efforts are being put in place to call the repressive Erdogan to order. There are several examples:
On May 29, last year, the European Association of Judges (EAJ) released a damning report that condemned Erdogan for foisting a regime of tyranny in Turkey, dismissing 49 judges basically because they passed judgements in favour of adherents of free speech he desperately wanted to jail. And this was a month after the Venice Commission, the Council of Europe’s advisory body on judicial and constitutional reform issues, harshly criticised Turkey on June 20, 2015. The Venice Commission said it had found “serious interference with the independence of judiciary in Turkey.”
On June 2, 2015, in faraway Washington DC, the World Editors Forum and the World Association of Newspapers issued a strong-worded statement in form of petition condemning Erdogan for making life most miserable for independent journalists in his country. As a Nigerian delegate to that conference, I was privileged to be a signatory to that petition, which was co-signed by 700 other top media personalities from 80 different countries of the world and sent to President Erdogan.
Similarly, the Nigerian Guild of Editors, the apex body of the journalism profession in Nigeria, has on two major occasions last year issued a communique strongly condemning President Erdogan and asking him to ensure freedom of the press in Turkey as well as freeing of all journalists jailed by his government.
Western governments and international press advocacy groups have accused Turkey of suppressing dissent and muzzling critics, forcing the sale of newspapers to government-friendly businessmen and exploiting laws to lock up journalists. The Reporters Without Borders, the world’s largest press advocacy group, ranks Turkey 159th out of 170 countries surveyed, while Freedom House classified Turkey “not free” in its latest press freedom index. The Committee to Protect Journalists, another major group advocating press freedom said “Turkish authorities are using never-before-seen methods to stipple dissent in the country. Scores of journalists are either behind bars or facing criminal charges over their reporting in Turkey.”
And as pointed earlier, Today’s Zaman, the largest selling newspaper in Turkey, whose daily circulation is one million copies, is being severely harassed, with some of its top editors arrested because it is owned by people sympathetic to the Hizmet (Gulen) Movement. So also are the Cihan News Agency, the Samanyolu Broadcasters, as well as the Journalists and Writers Foundation, which have been in the forefront of campaign against according prominence to dastardly acts of terrorists, including publishing stories about their heroics on the front pages of newspapers. The Foundation believes, and rightly so, that such publications always give terrorists a psychological edge. The sweeping media crackdown is aimed at ensuring organisations like the Cihan, a reputable news agency through which the rest of the world get authentic news about Turkey, close shop or forced to be administered by pro-Erdogan trustees.
Hassan Cemal, a respected 72 year old veteran journalist with 47 years’ experience in a symposium on press freedom last year, said: “I have witnessed military coups. I have seen my newspaper being shut down several times. I have lost friends to political murders. Many of my colleagues spent time in prison, many were subjected to torture.” But the heartache he felt three months ago was like “none I had felt before.”
Sadly, these represent only a tip of the iceberg. And the world can only afford to fold its arms or maintain neutrality at its peril. This, and definitely not later, is the time to rise beyond rhetoric to ensure the world does not end up with an avoidable Hitler
- Gaya is the Vice President (North) of the Nigerian Guild of Editors.
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Turkey recalls envoy to Germany over ‘genocide’ claim
Turkey has recalled its envoy to Germany in protest against German MPs declaring the 1915 massacre of Armenians during the First World War (WWI) as “genocide.”
Turkey called the vote “an example of ignorance and disrespect.”
Armenians said up to 1.5 million of their people died in the atrocities of 1915, the BBC reports.
Turkey said the toll was much lower and rejects the term “genocide.”
The vote heightens German-Turkish tensions at a time when Turkey’s help is needed to control migrant arrivals.
The Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said the resolution would seriously affect relations with Germany, and that the government would consider further measures in response to the vote.
The Turkish Foreign Minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu tweeted: “The way to close the dark pages in your own history is not by besmirching the history of other countries with irresponsible and groundless parliamentary decisions,” a clear reference to Germany’s Nazi past.
But the German Foreign Minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, called for calm.
“As expected, Turkey has reacted, and I hope that we will succeed in the next days and weeks to avoid any overreaction,” he told journalists during a visit to Buenos Aires.
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Turkey opposition journalists jailed in press freedom trial
An Istanbul court last Friday jailed two opposition journalists on charges of revealing state secrets, in a trial that has become a lightning rod for concerns about the erosion of press freedom in Turkey.
Can Dundar, editor-in-chief of leading opposition daily Cumhuriyet, was sentenced to five years and 10 months at the closed-door trial, while his Ankara bureau chief Erdem Gul was handed five years in prison, television stations said.
The sentencing came hours after Dundar escaped an apparent attempt on his life by a gunman outside the courthouse.
The two men were acquitted of espionage but were found guilty of revealing state secrets over a story accusing the government of seeking to illicitly deliver arms bound for Syria.
They will not immediately be placed in detention as the court of appeal has yet to rule on the case.
“We will continue to do our job as journalists, despite all these attempts to silence us,” Dundar told reporters after the verdict. “We have to preserve courage in our country.”
Media identified the gunman who attacked Dundar outside the courthouse as 40-year-old Murat Sahin.
Brandishing a pistol, the attacker had fired at Dundar as he stood outside during a break as the court prepared to deliver its verdict.
Dundar was unharmed and the gunman, who fired two or three times in front of TV cameras assembled for the trial, was detained by police. NTV television reported that its reporter Yagiz Senkal was lightly injured by a ricocheting bullet.
“You are (a) traitor. You will pay a price,” the attacker shouted at Dundar, according to CNN-Turk television.
Television footage showed Dundar’s wife Dilek holding the attacker by his collar and handing him to the police, with bloggers on social media saluting her bravery.
Sahin was reportedly a former factory worker who had long been unemployed and had an unspecified criminal past. An Istanbul resident, he hailed from the central Anatolian city of Sivas.
CNN-Turk reported him as saying he had wanted to teach Dundar “a lesson” and that he had acted alone. “I did not want to kill him, but I could have done it,” he was quoted as saying.
Special plain clothes police agents turned their weapons on the gunman, ordering him to lie chest down on the ground before detaining him.
“We know very well who showed me as a target,” Dundar said after the attack, accusing President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and pro-government media of whipping up a climate of hatred against him.
Fears over press freedoms have steadily grown since Erdogan became president in August 2014, with around 2,000 people, including many journalists, facing charges of insulting the president.
“Journalism is considered a crime in Turkey,” said Christophe Deloire, secretary general of press freedom group Reporters Without Borders.
“This outrageous verdict sends an extremely clear signal of intimidation to an entire profession that is struggling to survive,” he added.
RSF ranks Turkey 149th out of 180 countries in its latest World Press Freedom Index. Secular newspaper Cumhuriyet is staunchly opposed to the Erdogan government.
Its report on a shipment of arms intercepted at the Syrian border in January 2014 sparked a furore when it was published last May, fuelling speculation about Turkey’s role in the Syrian conflict and its alleged ties to Islamist groups in the country.
Erdogan had reacted furiously to the allegations, personally warning Dundar he would “pay a heavy price”.
Dundar and Gul spent three months in Silivri jail in the Istanbul suburbs, before being freed on February 26 by a constitutional court ruling that Erdogan had publicly condemned.
The state has also accused them of being manipulated by US-based Muslim preacher Fethullah Gulen — Erdogan’s arch foe — but the court has yet to rule on these allegations.
Last week an Istanbul court sentenced two prominent Cumhuriyet journalists to two years behind bars for illustrating their columns with a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed published by French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo. There are also concerns about the security of journalists in Turkey, particularly after the 2007 murder of the Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink.
A 17-year-old dropout was convicted of the murder but dozens of former police chiefs went on trial last month on negligence charges for failing to prevent the murder plot.
- Culled from The Citizen
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MSF: 100,000 Syrians trapped by fighting near Turkish border
The Aid group, Doctors without Borders (MSF),on Monday warned that over 100,000 people were trapped in a small pocket in northern Syria, amid ongoing clashes between Islamic State (IS) and rebels.
“Over the past week, more than 35,000 people have fled camps for displaced people which were taken over by IS or which are close to frontlines.
“They join those stranded by previous conflict,’’ MSF said.
According to the aid group, Turkish border remains largely shut with only some medical cases being allowed to cross.
It added that some medical clinics in Azaz were forced to shut while those still open are under intense pressure, flooded with cases.
However, MSF was also critical of the European Union.
“It is unacceptable that the current efforts of the EU are focused on how to return Syrian refugees to Turkey, instead of on how to assure safety and protection for those amassing at the Syrian-Turkish border,’’ it said.
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RIO 2016 OLYMPICS: Wrestling federation targets two more slots in Turkey
President of the Nigeria Wrestling Federation, Hon Daniel Igali has revealed that the federation is seeking to increase the number of wrestlers that will represent the country at Rio 2016 Olympic Games after picking six more slots at the just concluded Africa /Oceania Olympic qualifier in Algiers, Algeria.
Speaking at the team’s arrival at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport in Lagos on Wednesday, Igali said that the duo of Blessing Onyebuchi (75kg) and Melvin Bibo (74kg) who won bronze medals in Algeria still have the chance of joining the Olympic train if they attend the last qualifier scheduled for May 6–8 in Istanbul, Turkey.
Mercy Genesis (48kg), Aminat Adeniyi (58kg), Blessing Oborududu (63kg), Hannah Reuben (69Kg), Daniel Amas (65K) and Soso Tamara (97kg) joined Odunayo Adekuoroye who had earlier qualified by winning a bronze medal in the 53kg weight class at the 2015 World Championships in Las Vegas, USA.
“Blessing Onyebuchi and Melvin Bibo have the opportunity of qualifying for the Olympics at the last qualifying tournament in Turkey if we can secure the funds.
“It now up to the National Sports Commission, our direction and how we will move forward from now will be dependent on funds available to us. The team will go on break and will resume camping in about two weeks.”
While commending the wrestlers for their performance in Algeria, Igali said, “Apart from the glory going to the Almighty, the praises should go to the coaches and the young men and women in the Arena who have worked so hard over the last few years to get this far. We are merely cheer leaders.”
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Nigeria, Turkey to build on $2.3b trade relations
The National Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA) has beefed up trade ties with Turkey, the 18th largest economy in the world. This is in view of the dwindling revenue from oil.
The consolidation between NACCIMA and Turkey is expected to yield more investment to boost major sectors, including power, manufacturing, mining, construction, agricultur/agro-allied, aviation and security.
NACCIMA President, Dr. Bassey Edem, who spoke at the Nigeria-Turkey business forum in Abuja, during the week, said it was imperative for the countries to strengthen extant trade relations considering the huge trade volume built over the years.
He expressed Nigeria’s readiness to negotiate specific incentives for investors in consultation with appropriate government agencies and also assist incoming and existing investors with the provision of support services as well as facilitate procurement of all business approvals.
“Nigeria and Turkey have over the years sought a way to fill the vacuum that exists between the two country’s trade relations, through signing bilateral agreements, organizing trade shows and exhibitions in Nigeria and Turkey to encourage both countries open up more trade and investment relations,” he said.
According to the president, the trade volume between the two countries which stood at $2.3 billion as at 2014, needs to be enhanced, hence the need for Turkish business partners to utilise the opportunity of the forum to further develop long term business relationship with Nigerian counterparts.
He said: “Even though Turkey currently has a comparative advantage with respect to trade relationship between it and Nigeria, we believe this could be balanced when our Turkish counterparts consider more of technology transfer by partnering with their Nigerian counterparts to invest in some specific sectors of the Nigerian economy most especially at this time that the Nigeria Government is very committed to the diversification of the economy from crude oil.”
Noting that Nigeria is among the next destinations for global economic prosperity, he said the country’s emerging market economy is positioned as the largest in Africa and 26th in the world, with a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of over $520 million and a population of over 170 million people.
He added that Nigeria remains a thriving investment destination in Africa with the certainty of good return on investment within a reasonable time span.
President Republic of Turkey, Mr. Tayyip Erdogan, said Nigeria plays an important role in Turkey’s African initiative hence Turkey has high interest in expanding her business foray in Nigeria.
“As the Turkish business community, we also support Nigeria’s goal of becoming one of the top-20 countries by 2020. We believe that Turkey has an important role to play for Nigeria to realise this goal,” Erdogan said.
He reiterated that the country is working towards substantial partnership to increase the trade volume between both countries in a short time.
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Boko Haram: Turkey pledges support to Nigeria
Turkish President, Mr. Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday assured Nigeria of its support in the fight against terrorist, Boko Haram.
He gave the assurance at a joint press conference after holding bilateral talks with President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Stressing that his country and Nigeria suffer the same constant threats of terrorists’ attacks, Erdogan said that it is better for the two countries to collaborate to defeat the menace.
The Turkish President, who spoke through an interpreter, noted that more Muslims have died in the terrorists’ attacks in Turkey and Nigeria and that people should not try to associate terrorism with any tribe or group as it would only serve to “assist the terrorists”.
He harped on the need for collaborative efforts in the anti-terror war as he condoled with Nigerians on the death of thousands of citizens resulting from Boko Haram attacks.
According to him, he would not allow any group in Turkey with peculiar interests dictate the pace or direction of his government’s efforts to tackle terrorism.
Arriving Nigeria with 150 Turkish businessmen, he said that Nigerian and Turkish entrepreneurs should mutually invest across the two countries which have a combined population of 260 million and the volume of trade between the two countries standing at $1.1billion.
He said: “Our total trade volume is currently at $1,145billion our export is $314million and our import is $831million. As you see the result is to the favour of Nigeria.
“I believe that if the two countries combine forces making use of our own respective resources we would be able to come up with even better outcomes.
“I want to call on Nigerian business people to also make investment in Turkey. We are ready to expand all the sectors that we can to them, particularly Turkish construction contracting companies which rank second in the world.
“We are ready to share our experiences particularly in the area of irrigation and agriculture.” he said
President Buhari thanked Turkey for training the Nigerian police and giving Nigeria quality equipment.
He said that his government and Nigeria would not be demoralized by the activities of Boko Haram.
Buhari also commiserated with Turkey on the deaths and carnage perpetrated by terrorists in that country, stressing that if far developed countries could be struck by terrorists, it showed how vulnerable less developed countries are.
According to him, delegations of both countries just signed memoranda of understanding on trade and economic cooperation and industrial cooperation, while others will still be signed on energy and security.
Buhari accepted Erdogan’s invitation to embark on a state visit to Turkey as soon as possible.