Erdogan’s War Against Kurds in Southeast Turkey is ‘Part of Business Plan’

February 17, 2016 By administrator

Most construction companies in Turkey belong to Erdogan mafia gang,

Ankara has unleashed a devastating war against Kurds in the southeast Turkey to “urgently nationalize” the affected structures and implement the AKP-led project of Urban Change in Diyarbakir, Istanbul-based independent scholar Dr. Can Erimtan writes, dubbing the process as “disaster capitalism à la Turca.”

The Kurdish peace process launched by Recep Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) back in 2009 has been eventually brought to an end by Ankara, who now has unleashed an all-out war against its own population in southeastern Turkey.

“The Turkish-state-as-led-by-the-AKP has been waging all-out war against the PKK [Kurdistan Workers’ Party] ever since the June elections proved unable to produce the desired outcome. In fact, the hostilities began on 24-25 July 2015 when Turkey’s Armed Forces (TSK) undertook Operation Martyr Yalcın aimed at PKK and ISIS [Daesh] positions in northern Iraq (KRG) and northern Syria (Rojava),” Istanbul-based independent scholar Dr. Can Erimtan narrates in his article for New Eastern Outlook.

Citing Human Rights Watch’s December report, the scholar calls attention to the fact that since July 2015 Kurdish civilians including women, children and elderly residents have been killed in the course of the Erdogan government’s military operation in southeastern Turkey.

The severe military crackdown has led to the destruction of numerous buildings and monuments, including mosques and churches.

According to Erimtan, the ongoing operation is not a mere punitive action, but, apparently, part of Ankara’s business plan.

The crux of the matter is that since 2010 the AKP-led government has repeatedly made vain attempts to kick off the Urban Change program in Turkey’s southeast region. The project envisaged that 330 individual buildings would be demolished in the area of Sur in Diyarbakir.

“In view of the numerous protests against this apparently wanton and profit-driven destruction, these controlled demolitions were brought to a halt subsequently. But now that real estate is being destroyed in the course of the ongoing armed conflict, Turkey’s State Housing Agency Directorate (TOKİ) has come to the fore once more,” Erimtan elaborates.

Turkish pro-government media outlets have begun to bang the drum for the AKP-led program of Urban Change in Diyarbakir, claiming that the affected structures should be “urgently” nationalized and rebuilt.

There is something very fishy about the Turkish Ministry for Environment and Urban Planning’s report ‘Urban Change and Diyarbakir,’ issued in February 2015, when nothing hinted at any trouble, the scholar stresses.

“The report deals specifically with the area of Sur within the prefecture of Diyarbakir and proposes the realization of ‘a comprehensive change’ in favor of earlier ‘localized interventions’ or ‘narrow-scope implementations’ in order to accomplish feats of ‘conservation,’ ‘regeneration,’ and ‘renewal’ in the area,” Erimtan explains.

The lucrative project envisioned the construction of 8,000 new buildings and the conservation of 1,000 historical monuments.

What lies beneath Ankara’s punitive operation in southeastern Turkey? Apparently it is Erdogan‘s “disaster capitalism.”

Erimtan refers to Canadian author Naomi Klein’s book “The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism” (2007) that describes the controversial strategy invented by US economist Milton Friedman and then implemented by his followers all over the world.

“Only a crisis — actual or perceived — produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around. That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes the politically inevitable,” Friedman wrote in the 1960s.

Klein’s book tells the story of the utter victory of neoliberalism and corporations which used natural and man-made disasters and wars to ruin a region’s economy and infrastructure in order to grab its assets and natural resources.

Remarkably, in 2015 independent Australian journalist Antony Loewenstein released his book “Disaster Capitalism: Making a Killing out of Catastrophe” that echoes Klein’s concept and confirms that disaster has become big business.

Erimtan believes that the Erdogan government is implementing its own version of disaster capitalism in Turkey. Instead of bolstering the country’s productivity and increasing its gross domestic savings, the AKP is pushing ahead with widespread privatization of Turkey’s state assets and enterprises.

The ongoing armed conflict is seen as an ideal business opportunity by Ankara: ignoring the people on the ground the Erdogan government is planning to carry out its lucrative building project in southeast Turkey.

German MP: West ‘Should Put End’ To Erdogan’s Secret Ties With ISIS

January 8, 2016 By administrator

Deputy Chairman of the Left Party Sahra Wagenknecht. Clemens Blian/AFP

As long as the Turkish President pursues a policy that contributes to the prosperity of terrorists in the Middle East, a resolution on addressing the situation in the region would be extremely difficult, German politician Sahra Wagenknecht said.

By Sputnik News | January 8, 2016

Western countries should exert pressure on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and put an end to the secret relations of Ankara and Daesh (also known as Islamic State terrorist group), otherwise the conflict in Syria may escalate, Deputy Chairman of the Left Party Sahra Wagenknecht said in an interview with German magazine Spiegel

“The escalation risks are extremely high,” Wagenknecht said. “There are now 15 countries fighting in Syria, sometimes together, sometimes side by side, sometimes against each other. There is no common strategy,” she added.

According to the politician, the parties involved do not have any consensus regarding their actions. They don’t even have an agreement on the fact that the fight against the Daesh should be of the highest priority. For instance, Turkey has different priorities and maintains ties with jihadists.

“Erdogan has to be put under pressure to finally stop his covert terrorist support and close the Turkish border for the Islamic State,” Wagenknecht said.

At the same time, the German politician stressed that the military intervention plays into the hands of Daesh terrorists, because the airstrikes lead to a large number of civilian casualties, causing hatred and indignation among the local population.

“Germany is involved in a war, the course of which no one can really control,” the German politician stressed.

Since 2014, Daesh militants have seized vast areas in Syria and Iraq, and have declared a caliphate under the rule of Sharia law in territories they control.

After that the US formed a coalition of some 60 nations which has been carrying out airstrikes against the terrorists since September 2014. The mission has not been authorized by the Syrian government or the UN Security Council.

Iraq: Kurds Protest Erdogan’s Invasion, Bombings of Iraq

December 10, 2015 By administrator

Kurds in Iraq protested Turkey’s invasion of Iraq, which is a threat to both the independence of Iraq and the Kurds living in the northern part of the country.

Although Turkey found a friend in Iraqi Kurdistan’s most dominant clan leader and current president Massoud Barzani, many Iraqi Kurds have opposed the measure.

On Wednesday, Turkish jets bombed Iraq, hitting the mountainous Qandil region, on the border with Iran, AP reported. According to Turkey, the mountains are home to camps of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, banned in Turkey.

“Yesterday, in multiple provinces of Iraqi Kurdistan there were popular manifestations, which local politicians also took part in. The protest expressed a harsh condemnation of the invasion and quartering of Turkish troops on the territory of a foreign state,” head of Kurdish News Network (KNN) Sohayeb Ahmad Kakeh Mahmoud told Sputnik Persian.

Mahmoud added that protesters chanted nationalist slogans, expressing their disapproval of the Kurdistan Regional Government’s silence in regards to the Turkish military’s actions. At the same time, Barzani left Iraqi to hold talks with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara.

Syrian Kurds also reportedly condemned Erdogan’s actions.

“[Democratic Union Party head Salih Muslim] emphasized that Turkey is violating the territorial integrity of another state. Muslim also made an important statement: Turkey, which is ready to defend its territorial integrity at all costs, even shooting down Russian planes on its border for so-called airspace violations, yet itself invades an independent state,” Mahmoud added.

Is Iran Next on Erdogan’s Hit List?

Turkey has also continued to attack Kurdistan Workers’ Party positions in the Qandil Mountains, which border Iran.

“Despite the Turkish air force now attacking Qandil, the mountainous region bordering Iran, I still believe that Ankara is not ready to open yet another front by starting a war with Iran,” Mahmoud said.

Turkey has also managed to turn nearly all of its friends in the region into enemies, as Iranian Ettelaat newspaper Abulkasem Kasemzade recently noted, breaking the relationships he once had with Russia, Syria and Iran.

“Turkey has now simply surrounded itself with a circle of confrontation. On one hand, there is cooled Russia, from another, scrapes associated with the exposure of its collaboration with Daesh terrorists, lastly the simply insufficiently considered military operation against Kurds,” Mahmoud added.

According to Mahmoud, Syria and Iraq must cooperate to drive Turkish troops out of Iraq, as the invasion, and Turkey’s attacks on Kurdish groups in the region, is dangerous for Kurds living in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Source:sputniknews.com

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 and Syria Erdogan’s dangerous gambit

July 31, 2015 By administrator

By bombing the Kurds, as well as Islamic State, Turkey is adding to the chaos in the Middle East economist.com report

TURKEY’S allies in the West have felt increasingly queasy about its wayward president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. At home he has become authoritarian and wants to change the constitution to give himself more power. Abroad he has been indulgent towards militants passing through his country to fight in Syria. In the year since the jihadists of Islamic State (IS) declared their caliphate in parts of Iraq and Syria, and America gathered a coalition to “degrade and ultimately destroy” them, Mr Erdogan has refused to let NATO allies use Turkish bases.

Perhaps he feared that the jihadists would target Turkey. Or perhaps he thought they were useful pawns in the violent geopolitics of the Middle East. Such illusions should have been blown away on July 20th, when a suicide-bomber killed 32 people in Suruc, a Turkish town on the border with Syria. Within days Turkey said it would allow America to use its base at Incirlik, and its own jets bombed IS. There is now talk of creating a buffer zone in Syria to cut off IS’s last supply lines.

Many hope Mr Erdogan has at last had a moment of clarity about the IS menace. So far, though, he has only added to the murk of the region’s wars. His air force has mostly bombed the Kurds who, in various guises, have proved to be the most resolute fighters against IS. The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been fighting an on-off insurgency against Turkey for decades, invited retribution by breaking a two-year ceasefire and killing several policemen and soldiers, in reprisal for Turkey’s supposed collusion in the Suruc bombing, which hit a Kurdish cultural centre. But Mr Erdogan is being reckless, too. By deliberately stirring nationalist, anti-Kurdish sentiment, he is endangering the chance of a lasting settlement of the Kurdish question and weakening the fight against IS.

Why the caliphate endures

Under attack from America and an impressive list of allies, IS should by now be in full retreat. There are cracks in the caliphate, to be sure, but it has endured and has at times even taken new territory. Its resilience creates a myth of God-given invincibility that radicalises admirers around the world, draws recruits and spawns copycat groups.

The caliphate survives because its defeat is nobody’s priority. America’s aim is to limit its military commitment in the Middle East. For Saudi Arabia and the Gulf monarchies, the big threat is Iran. Iran’s main mission is to prop up the Syrian dictator, Bashar Assad. Mr Assad’s first concern is holding other rebels at bay. The rebels’ obsession is to get rid of Mr Assad.

The hardest fighting against IS in the past year has been waged, in Iraq, by Shia and Kurdish Peshmerga militias; and, in Syria, by the Kurdish forces of the People’s Protection Units (YPG), an offshoot of the PKK. The Syrian Kurds’ valour in defending the town of Kobane, in full view of television cameras just across the border in Turkey, earned much admiration and the direct support of America’s air force. Though Turkey sheltered Kobane’s fleeing civilians, it watched with indifference as Kurdish fighters desperately fought off IS; it only grudgingly allowed Iraqi Kurds to reinforce them.

With the most powerful army in the region, Turkey could tip the scales against IS. But it, too, has had other priorities (see article). At first Mr Erdogan made it his personal mission to get rid of Mr Assad; later, he worried about preventing Kurds from making more gains. When the Kurds evicted IS from the border town of Tel Abyad, Turkey warned them not to cross the Euphrates and link up with another Kurdish enclave to the west. The “Islamic State-free zone” in Syria that Turkey is urging looks more like a Kurd-free zone.

Many suspect Mr Erdogan of using the crisis for his own political advantage at home. When his Islamist-tinged Justice and Development (AK) party first came to power in 2002 Mr Erdogan was a reformer who sought a deal with the Kurds. But in June’s election he was denied a majority by the strong showing of the People’s Democratic Party (HDP), a slick left-leaning group with strong Kurdish links. So Mr Erdogan is now playing the anti-Kurdish card. He has disowned a “road map” to peace negotiated by AK and the PKK. He says peace talks are “not possible”, and wants to strip away the immunity of HDP MPs. By bombing PKK bases in Iraq, Mr Erdogan may be trying to cut the support for HDP before calling new elections this autumn to gain the votes he needs to change the constitution.

If so, Mr Erdogan’s vainglory risks placing Turkey on the pyre of the Middle East. The AK party should ignore the president’s scheming, get on with forming a coalition with centrists and resume peace talks with the Kurds. The PKK must restore the ceasefire: more than three decades of fighting produced only misery. Now that the PKK has abandoned its old separatism, negotiations on devolution and language rights offer the best prospect of peace. If Turkish and Kurdish guns were pointed at IS, rather than at each other, it would be better for Turkey, the Middle East and the world.
Read more at http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21660123-bombing-kurds-well-islamic-state-turkey-adding-chaos-middle#7urXVfVERvmPUsKY.99

Turkish President Erdogan’s Triple Defeat

June 7, 2015 By administrator

Voters struck back at the ruling AK Party in parliamentary elections Sunday, depriving it of a majority and likely stopping the president’s latest power grab.

By David A. Graham

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan suffered a painful triple defeat in elections on Sunday.

While Erdogan himself was not on the ballot, his Justice and Development Party (or AKP) lost its hold on parliament. The AKP was still clearly the leading party, garnering around 41 percent of the vote in preliminary returns, but it failed to win an outright majority. A second defeat was that one reason for the AKP’s struggles was a surge by the Peoples’ Democratic Party, or HDP. For the first time, the party—a liberal group whose traditional base is Turkey’s Kurdish minority—crossed the magical 10 percent threshold required to actually earn seats in parliament. It did that in part by campaigning against the president. All that combined to produce what might be most galling of all to Erdogan: It means his hopes at changing the constitution to produce an executive presidency more like the U.S. setup are likely dead.

The presidential position is currently largely ceremonial, though there’s no doubt that Erdogan holds the reins of power. He was, however, officially barred from campaigning during the election. While Erdogan insisted he had benign intentions in seeking the new setup, some observers warned that it would be a step on the way to dictatorship.

It may be that Erdogan simply overreached in the last few years. While he’s Turkey’s most popular and powerful leader in decades, his eagerness to expand his reach alienated voters, particularly urban and secular ones. He embarked on a $615 million white-elephant palace project, imprisoned and intimidated the press and his political opponents, tried to block YouTube and Twitter, and feuded with Fethullah Gulen, a religious leader who’d help bring him to power. Anger boiled over in the streets of Istanbul and elsewhere in 2013, sparked by protests over trying to turn a park in the city into a mall. Meanwhile, the economy sputtered.

Syria Bashar Assad: Erdogan’s government uses the same tools as Ottomans against Armenians

June 5, 2015 By administrator

The people of Syria and Armenia are faced with the similar challenges and dangers, President of Syria Bashar Assad said during his meeting with the visiting delegation of the Armenian-Syrian Friendship Association in Damascus.

The Ottomans who committed massacres against the Armenian people a hundred years ago are today, represented by Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his government, using the same tools, mainly terrorism, against the Syrian people, President Assad said.

Head of Armenian delegation Tachat Vardapetyan, for his part, stressed that the Armenian people stand by the side of the people of Syria in the face of the regionally-backed terrorist war waged on them, voicing confidence that Syria will get over this war and rout terrorism and its backers, SANA agency reported.

Talks during the meeting highlighted that further developing the relations between the National Assembly of Armenia and the Syrian People’s Assembly would help in consolidating the relationship between the two countries.

Chairman of the Syrian-Armenian Friendship Association at the People’s Assembly Butrus Marjaneh and Armenia’s Ambassador in Damascus Arshak Poladian attended the meeting.

Turkey’s bark is much worse than its bite. Erdogan’s Rage at Armenian Genocide Recognition Hurts the Turks

April 23, 2015 By administrator

The Turkish president’s ‘hot-headedness’ is becoming more and more a sideshow as the world recognizes the genocide, says Louis Fishman.

What is Turkey thinking?

That is the question some analysts are asking themselves in the days following Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s condemnation of Pope Francis I. Francis referred to the Armenian “Genocide” as one of the three greatest mass murders of the 20th century in a joint mass with Armenian priests. He grouped the Armenian Genocide with the Holocaust and Stalinism in the same breath. Just yesterday, Austria also recognized the Armenian Genocide, prompting Turkey to recall its ambassador.

As Erdogan has reacted in the past, he was furious. He said the Pope would be wise not to make the same mistake again. In that, Erdogan extended the same angry response he had used against France several years ago against one of the most popular social and political figures on the planet.

It is a public relations disaster says Professor Louis Fishman of Brooklyn College, who focuses on Turkish Affairs.

“Due to the elections, the ‘angry’ part was revived. But, it’s not like it used to be.”

That is the assessment of the International Crisis Group’s Nigar Göksel, who wrote this week, “The nationalist vote is up for grabs in this June’s general election, leaving the incumbent AKP especially wary of being seen as bowing to foreign parliamentary resolutions.”

Yet these reactions have not been isolated to election cycles. Generally speaking, Fishman emphasizes that “Turkey should understand its reaction is really bad for public relations.”

Yet paradoxically, Erdogan’s Islamist AKP party has been given a lot more credit recognizing anything happened at all to the Armenians than previous Turkish governments.

Even if the government refuses to recognize it as a genocide, there are groups within its supporters that do openly recognize it as a genocide,” says Fishman. “In fact, if one reads PM Davutoglu’s recent statement, it is clear that the government has taken steps in recognizing the injustice. However, of course, the words need to be met with actions.”

“Beginning last year, it expressed condolences to the Armenians on the anniversary of the killings,” says Amberin Zaman of the Economist. “Yet there is a strong whiff of political expediency about its magnanimity.”

But the politics cuts both ways. The main Kurdish HDP party in Turkey has formally apologized to Armenians for acts conducted by Kurds in the genocide. Again, political expediency is leading to an opening. But still, the Kurdish party is to the left of Erdogan, who is courting votes on the other side of the spectrum.

So does Erdogan represent an older way of thinking in Turkey?

“Let us remember that Erdogan is the President, and even if the full powers are vested in the PM, he does set the trend. There is no doubt that his hot-headed reactions do not help, and partially set the stage.”

“However, the recalling of ambassadors is a short-sighted policy and regardless of who setting the stage, this seems simply to be motivated by a flawed policy. ”

When asked if the Turkish president understood the ramifications of taking on such a massive figure like the Pope, Fishman said that he probably thought the Pope was a soft target.

Fishman is referring to the reverse effect the warning has had. Since Erdogan’s backlash at the Pope, the European Parliament has also voted in favor of recognizing the Armenian Genocide. The language referred several times to using “the commemoration of the centenary of the Armenian genocide” as a launching point for political reconciliation, but the message was clearer than ever that Europe wants that reconciliation to involve acknowledgement.

However, the fallout has its limits. President Obama is still hesitant to use the term, presumably because of Turkey’s strategic value in American efforts against ISIS or in any number of other regional issues.

Yet, people like the President of the United States and perhaps the Prime Minister of Israel might take into account that any fallout over this issue alone would likely be temporary (not withstanding other issues between Israel and Turkey).

When asked if the repercussions for Turkish public relations were quantifiable, Fishman said the Turks’ reaction is not having the impact President Erdogan would like it to have.

“To be frank, it seems that the world is no longer surprised by the short-sighted actions of the Turkish government. Many countries are thus dealing with it accordingly, knowing that Turkey’s bark is much worse than its bite.”

Source: israelnationalnews.com

The Erdogans’ lavish lifestyle “White tea”

April 3, 2015 By administrator

So what is the big deal? White tea is sold in well-stocked supermarkets all over the world, along with black and green tea, at $3-$4 for a pack of 20 tea bags. But that is not the white tea consumed at the presidential palace in Turkey. Indeed, even most residents in Rize are not aware of this white tea, which sells for about $1,800-$2,000 per kilo (2.2 pounds). Considering the increasing poverty and the fact that 22 million out of 77 million people in Turkey live on an average monthly income of $320, this most unrefined and luxurious white tea is not available at your regular supermarket. The majority of Turks, who are mostly black tea drinkers, have not even heard of white tea. The white tea consumed at the palace caused an uproar in social media, where people ridiculed the allegedly modest palace life of the Erdogan family.

Pinar Tremblay

Contributor, Turkey Pulse

Pinar Tremblay is a visiting scholar of political science at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona. She is a columnist for Turkish news outlet T24. Her articles have appeared in Time, New America, Hurriyet Daily News, Todays

Turkish man fined for spitting on President Erdoğan’s official car

March 27, 2015 By administrator

A 28-year-old man in Turkey was fined TL 7,600 for spitting on Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s official car, in a case in which he faced two years in prison for “insulting a public official.”

A case was opened against Fatih Koçkesen on charges of insulting then-Prime Minister Erdoğan by spitting on his official car, which was parked in front of Eyüp Sultan mosque in İstanbul on July 11, 2014. An indictment that was filed against him by the İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office was seeking up to two years imprisonment.

During his testimony at the court, Koçkesen reportedly said he spit on a car he thought to be that of Erdoğan to protest against the then-prime minister, whom he held responsible for a mine accident in Soma that left 301 workers dead.

The case was concluded in a hearing held at an İstanbul courthouse on Thursday. The court ordered Koçkesen to pay TL 7,600 on charges of “insulting a public official.”

The case comes amidst reports that Erdoğan has filed complaints on charges of “insulting” him against a total of 236 people in the 227 days since he was elected president in the election held on Aug. 10, 2014.