Ankara Archives

A Tchankaya in the Ankara region, a photo exhibition of an Armenian family evokes genocide and creates anger nationalists

November 12, 2015 By administrator

A Tchankaya in the Ankara region, a photo exhibition of an Armenian family organized by the city authorities in the cultural center of modern art created anger among the Turkish nationalist organizations.

According to the Turkish website Memurlar.net telling through pictures the history of the Armenian family the exhibition presents the Armenian Genocide, which has angered some of the population of Tchankaya.

The opening of the exhibition was done by the deputy chairman of the party “Republican People” Sezkin Tanrekoulou, a former member of the same party Atila Kart, Professor Oran and former Turkish Minister of Culture and Tourism Ertogrul Gunay. Everensel The website writes that the exhibition represents the family of brothers and Tsolak Aram tells Dildilian genocide, exodus of Armenians and the life of the Armenian community from 1872 to 1973. The exhibition entitled “testimonies of the past defunct Armenian family “will continue until November 22, despite the anger of some Turkish nationalist circles.

Krikor Amirzayan

Turkey: Ankara police raid Gülen-linked business group TUSKON

November 6, 2015 By administrator

AA photo

(hurriyet) Ankara police on Nov. 6 searched offices of business groups working under the Turkish Confederation of Businessmen and Industrialists (TUSKON), known to have close links to the movement of U.S.-based Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen.

The Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s office ordered the search targeting TUSKON’s member associations, Anadolu Agency reported. The order was issued by the Prosecutor’s Office Bureau for Crimes against the Constitutional Order, the Cihan News Agency said.

The raids were launched as part of an investigation into the “Parallel State Structure Terror Organization/Pro-Fetullah Terror Organization” (Fetullahçı Terör Örgütü), Anadolu Agency reported. The “Pro-Fetullah Terror Organization” was first cited in a draft indictment penned by the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office and finalized in April. The indictment stated that it had found “concrete evidence” that sympathizers of Gülen were trying to form a “Cemaat state” parallel to the state of the Republic of Turkey.

Police also this week detained dozens of high-ranking state officials and police officers in several cities, as part of the ongoing investigation into Gülen supporters.

TUSKON was founded in 2005 in Istanbul and, as defined on its institutional webpage, is an “umbrella organization representing seven business federations, 211 business associations and over 55,000 entrepreneurs from all over Turkey.”

TUSKON has played a role in diversifying Turkey’s exports, mainly to African countries and Latin America, at a time when such a move was vital due to the crisis in the eurozone, the largest destination for Turkish exports.

It has four foreign representative offices in Brussels, Washington, Moscow and Beijing.

November/06/2015

(FNA) Riyadh, Ankara in Collaboration to Supply Terrorists in Syria with Ukraine’s SAM Missiles

October 27, 2015 By administrator

(FNA)– Turkey and Saudi Arabia have developed a plan to supply sophisticated air defense missile systems to the terrorist groups in Syria from the Ukrainian army.

Saudi Arabia and Turkey are spending huge sums to open their path into the Ukrainian army’s missile depots to transfer the surface-to-air SAM-8 and SAM-9 missile systems to Northern Syria to strengthen the terrorist groups, the Arabic-language Lebanese al-Akhbar reported on Tuesday.

The daily underlined that the Ukrainian army officials are opposed to Russia and its military strikes against the terrorists in Syria.

According to al-Akhbar, certain sources have revealed that the Saudi-Turkish plan has already made so much success that Russia has revised contingency plans after assessments showed a strikingly higher possibility that their helicopters could be targeted by these anti-aircraft missiles now.

Turkey and Saudi Arabia have been supplying terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq with arms and funds all throughout the last 4 years.

In relevant remarks, Iraq’s Vice-President Nuri al-Maliki took Saudi Arabia and Turkey responsible for spreading terrorism through their huge continued support for terrorist groups, specially the ISIL.

“The ISIL was a movement created by certain regional states, headed by Saudi Arabia, with sectarian and political goals,” Maliki, a former Prime Minister, told FNA in the Northeastern city of Mashhad in August.

“The ISIL is supported by Saudi Arabia and Turkey as Ankara sought to overthrow President Assad’s government,” he added.

Elsewhere, Maliki referred to the internal situation in Iraq and its fight against the terrorist groups, and underlined the popular forces’ vital role in taking back ISIL-held regions.

The popular forces helped the Iraqi army after senior clerics issued a fatwa (religious decree) in support of campaign against terrorism and “we believe that there wouldn’t have been any Iraq now if it hadn’t been for them”, he added.

Terrorist State of Turkey: PM Davutoglu Confirms Ankara Striking Kurdish Positions in Syria

October 27, 2015 By administrator

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu confirmed Tuesday that the country’s military forces had struck Kurdish positions near the border in northern Syria.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Last week, Kurdish fighters in Syria accused the Turkish military of firing on their positions near the northern Syrian town of Tell Abyad, which the Kurds claimed as part of their “autonomous administration” last week.
“We struck twice,” Davutoglu said in an interview with Turkish television channel A Haber, not specifying the details of the operation.

He also stressed that the Turkish authorities have previously warned members of the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) not to cross the Western bank of the river Euphrates saying that Turkey would attack.

Ankara considers the PYD an affiliate of the Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK), which is prohibited in Turkey.
Kurds form the largest ethnic minority in Turkey accounting for 20 percent of the population. Relations between the two nations have been strained since 1984 after the Kurds had declared independence.
Tensions between the Turks and the Kurds escalated in July when Ankara launched a military campaign against the PKK after the group had claimed responsibility for the murders of two Turkish police officers.

Turkey: Court issues total media ban over Ankara suicide bombings

October 14, 2015 By administrator

An Ankara court issued on Oct. 14 a broad media ban over the Oct. 10 Ankara suicide bomber investigation.

According to the court decision, the ban includes “all kinds of news, interviews, criticism and similar publications in print, visual, social media and all kinds of media on the Internet” covered by the investigation. Report hurriyetdailynews.

All media outlets in the country have officially been notified of the decision, which brings in one of the broadest recent media bans and is effective immediately.

In addition, on Oct. 12, a restriction decision was given about the bombing investigation over the prosecutor’s demand. According to the decision, lawyers will not be able to take information and documents from the file with some exceptions. The same decision had been made over both the Suruç and Diyarbakır bomb attacks earlier this year.

Speaking to Reuters on Oct. 14, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said some of the suspects in a suicide bombing that killed at least 97 people in Ankara had spent months in Syria and that they could be linked to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) or the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

“We are working on [investigating] two terrorist organizations, Daesh [ISIL] and the PKK, because we have certain evidence regarding the suicide bombers having links with Daesh, but also some linkages with PKK groups,” Davutoğlu said.

The Oct. 10 bombing targeting a peace rally in the capital city of Ankara left at least 97 dead and wounded hundreds, marking one of the deadliest attacks in the country’s history.

From 2010 to 2014, Turkish media faced over 150 gag orders, Hürriyet daily reported last year. The subjects of the bans have included deadly attacks, corruption cases, the wiretapping of officials, a mining disaster and even football match-fixing claims.

Turkey: 18 Kurd from one family killed in Ankara blasts

October 14, 2015 By administrator

Hülya Ünal (L) says the identification process is still under way for three of her relatives. (Photo: Cihan)

Eighteen people from the same family lost their lives in the twin explosions that hit Ankara on Saturday, having traveled to the Turkish capital from Siirt province to attend a rally organized by pro-Kurdish and leftist activists, the Hürriyet daily reported on Wednesday.

Two blasts within seconds of each other killed 97 people and wounded over 500 on Saturday morning when pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) activists, leftists, labor unions and other civil society groups had gathered in Ankara for a march to protest the deaths of hundreds of civilians since the resumption of the conflict between Turkish security forces and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the country’s mainly Kurdish Southeast.

Speaking to Hürriyet on Tuesday, Hülya Ünal, a family member of the 18 relatives who died, said that three of them had not yet been officially identified. “I’ve been waiting in front of the [Ankara Council of] Forensic Medicine [ATK] morgue for four days. We have lost 18 people in our family. The identification process is still under way for three of my relatives — Filiz Batur, Bedriye Batur and Hasan Baykara. I have waited for 15 relatives in front of this door [of the morgue] and sent them to their hometown [for burial]. I was planning to show them around Ankara because they had never been here before. However, now I’m sending their bodies off [to their hometown].”

Growing anger against Erdogan, Top police officials sacked after Ankara attacks

October 14, 2015 By administrator

The Turkish interior ministry on Wednesday fired Ankara’s top police chief and two other officials as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted security shortcomings may have led to a double suicide bombing in the capital that killed 97 people, AFP news agency reports.
There has been growing anger against Erdogan and the government for alleged security lapses over the worst attack in modern Turkey’s history Saturday where two suicide bombers blew themselves in a crowd of peace activists.

Announcing the first dismissals in the wake of the disaster, the interior ministry said the chief of Ankara police Kadri Kartal as well the head of the city’s police intelligence and security departments had been sacked.

It said they had been removed on the suggestion of investigators “to allow for a healthy investigation” into the atrocity.
In his first public remarks over the bombings, Erdogan admitted there were security shortcomings but said their magnitude would be made clear only later.

15-year-old witness says Azerbaijanis were among Ankara suicide bombers

October 14, 2015 By administrator

A 15-year-old witness of the October 10 terrorist attack in Ankara told the police that the alleged suicide bombers spoke with each other in Azerbaijani, Turkish newspaper Milliyet reports, according to the Azerbaijani information portal Modern.az.

The witness, a female whose name is not revealed, told the police that the terrorist attack suspects first went to the restroom by the mosque. Then two women in hijabs went out from it, while four people remained inside. The girl says there were Azerbaijanis among those terrorists because those four people spoke in Azerbaijani and Kurdish.

She says the terrorists wrapped the bomb in a black piece of cloth, and one of the women tied it to herself. They also had bags.

“When we saw them, me and my friend, we went out. I told the police about those people but they did not listen to me. Four people remained inside, and another four were in the street. They all went in the same direction. They were ‘living bombs.’ One of them blew up behind, another – in the pool, the third one blew up in the crowd among the activists of the Peoples’ Democratic Party. The rest of the terrorists picked up the pieces of the exploded human bodies and smeared their faces and hands with their blood. The terrorists threw a bomb on my friend. He was torn to pieces. His head fell at my feet,” the girl recalls.

After the October 10 terrorist attack in Turkey, the names of 21 members of the IS group, who were wanted for a long time, again appeared on the agenda. According to the outlet, there is an Azerbaijani woman, Ulker Mammadova, wanted in Turkey, in the list of the six women in the group, who could have become the “living bombs.”

Commenting on the information that there is an Azerbaijani citizen in the Turkey intelligence list of potential IS kamikazes, political scientist Tofig Abbasov told Sputnik Azerbaijan that the Azerbaijanis’ presence in the IS is not a secret any more.

Kamil Salimov, an Azerbaijani expert on fight against terrorism, told Oxu.az that the people taking part in the terrorist activities of the IS can come back to their country where they have connections and resources to carry out any terrorist attack, and expose the society and the whole country to a great danger. This is a matter of concern, the expert highlighted.

The relationship between international terrorist groups and Azerbaijan originated in the early 1990s. That time, the Azerbaijani army, having failed in the aggression against Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR), retreated with losses. Trying to save the situation, the Azerbaijani leadership, headed by Heydar Aliyev attracted to the war against the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh international terrorists and members of radical groups from Afghanistan (groupings of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar), Turkey (“Grey Wolves”, etc.), Chechnya (groupings Basayev and Raduyev etc.) and some other regions.

Despite the involvement of thousands of foreign mercenaries and terrorists in the Azerbaijani army during the war, the Azerbaijani aggression against Nagorno-Karabakh Republic failed, and the Baku authorities were forced to sign an armistice with the NKR and Armenia. However, international terrorists established ties in Azerbaijan, and used them in the future. The Azerbaijanis were recruited and sent to Afghanistan and the North Caucasus, where they participated in the battles against the forces of the international coalition and Russian organizations. Over the recent years, the citizens of Azerbaijan have been actively engaged in terrorism and extremist activities in Russia, Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq.

Turkey bomb blasts: Erdoġan’s government blamed as thousands take to streets in Ankara

October 11, 2015 By administrator

Mourners and protesters gather in Turkish capital, blaming Erdoġan’s government for twin bomb attacks in which over 100 civilians died

Thousands of Turkish citizens gathered in central Ankara a day after twin bombings targeted a peace rally in the city, killing over a hundred civilians in an attack that demonstrators and mourners blamed squarely on the government of the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

Witnesses and victims’ families, as well as opposition parties, ascribed direct responsibility to the government for allegedly failing to provide any security measures ahead of the peace rally, saying police officers who arrived at the scene after the bombing fired teargas at grieving families who rushed there to inquire about their loved ones.

They also blamed Erdoğan’s government for allegedly sowing chaos ahead of next month’s parliamentary polls, either to delay the elections and retain power for his ruling Justice and Development party (AKP), or to increase his chances of securing a broader majority in the elections to maintain security.

“We are grieving, we are saddened, but we are also furious,” the Kurdish opposition leader, Selahattin Demirtas, told a rally in Sihhiye Square in central Ankara. “We will struggle, fight, and win back the democracy.”

Demonstrators shouted slogans condemning the Turkish president, chanting “chief and murderer Erdoğan” and “death to fascism”.

Brief scuffles earlier broke out as police used teargas to prevent people from laying red carnations at the site of the attack, the deadliest terrorist strike on Turkish soil in recent history. The pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic party (HDP) said said some members of its delegation sustained injuries.

Organisers searched the demonstration’s attendees and patted them down to avoid a repeat of the previous day’s attack as tension and anger rose at the previous day’s bloody events.

According to the HDP, the number of people killed in the bombing stands at 128, all but eight of whom have been identified and their names published by the HDP’s crisis desk.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing, and the government has denied any part in it. The prime minister, Ahmet Davutoğlu, cited the political upheaval in both Turkey and Syria and said the attack could have been carried out by Islamic State, Kurdish militants or radical leftist groups.

Turkey “State is the killer banner” Some 10,000 People Rally in Istanbul After Ankara Terror Attack

October 10, 2015 By administrator

Turkish citizens took to the streets of Istanbul condemning twin blasts in Ankara.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Almost 10,000 Turkish citizens took to the streets of Istanbul on Saturday condemning twin blasts in Ankara, which claimed the lives of at least 86 peace protesters, local media reported.
The protesters patrolled by numerous police officers marched down Istanbul’s central street, according to the Turkish IMC television channel.
Some people carried banners reading “the state is a killer” and “we know the killers”, blaming the Turkish government for the deadly attack.
Rallies were also carried out in other Turkish cities, including Batman and Diyarbakir, where the police used tear gas to disperse the protesters.