Istanbul the Hub of Terrorism: US warns of ‘credible threats’ to tourist areas in Istanbul, Antalya

April 9, 2016 By administrator

n_97562_1 The United States embassy in Turkey on April 9 warned American citizens of “credible threats” to tourist areas in Istanbul and the Mediterranean resort city of Antalya, a day after Israel warned of “imminent risks” of attacks.

“The U.S. Mission in Turkey would like to inform U.S. citizens that there are credible threats to tourist areas, in particular to public squares and docks in Istanbul and Antalya,” read the emergency travel warning published on its official website.

On April 8, Israel reissued and accentuated a warning to its citizens to avoid Turkey over the “immediate risks” of attacks, weeks after three Israelis were killed in an Istanbul suicide bombing.

“Following a situational assessment, we are reiterating and sharpening the high level of threat in Turkey,” the counter terrorism bureau said.

Its warning came hours after the Turkish foreign ministry announced “progress towards finalizing the agreement” on restoring ties with Israel, a day after both sides held talks in London.

“There are immediate risks of attacks being carried out in the country, and we stress the threat applies to all tourism sites in Turkey,” Israel’s counter terrorism bureau said in a statement.

It called on all Israelis to avoid visiting Turkey and urged Israeli tourists there to leave “as soon as possible,” defining the threat as level 2 — “concrete and high” — the same as in its previous warning from March 28.

Three Israelis and an Iranian were killed and 39 people wounded when a man blew himself up on Istanbul’s Istiklal Avenue, a famous shopping street in the heart of Turkey’s largest city, on March 19.

Turkey said the bomber had links to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), and on April 5 Israel’s defense ministry said he had most likely targeted the Israelis deliberately.

Azeri Journalist Writing for Armenian Newspaper Receives Death Threats, Forced to Live Abroad

November 5, 2015 By administrator

BY VERA TAN
FROM GLOBAL JOURNALIST

Azerbaijan-born journalist and blogger Arzu Geybullayeva has written for major news outlets like Foreign Policy and al-Jazeera. Yet it’s her work for Agos, a Turkish-Armenian newspaper, that has led to threats from her native land.

Azerbaijan and neighboring Armenia do not have diplomatic relations. The former Soviet republics have fought periodic border skirmishes since a 1994 ceasefire suspended a war over Nagorno-Karabakh, a Rhode Island-sized enclave within Azeri borders that is populated mainly by ethnic Armenians.

For the Istanbul-based Geybullayeva, the criticism of her work for Agos began with small Azeri outlets, and spread to Azerbaijan’s state-owned media. Eventually Geybullayeva, who frequently blogs about human rights in Azerbaijan, received death threats online. By 2014 she realized it was no longer safe for her to return to her home country.

That year the Azeri government of President Ilham Aliyev unleashed a crackdown on the media. Among other incidents, the government arrested Khadija Ismayilova, an Azeri journalist who investigated corruption in Aliyev’s family. Ilgar Nasibov, a journalist and human rights activist, was beaten unconscious in what his wife told local media was likely an attack by Azerbaijan’s Interior Ministry.

Among the tactics the Azeri government has used against Geybullayeva is to apply pressure to her family in Azerbaijan, a strategy it has used againstother journalists and dissidents. Geybullayeva, 32, spoke with Global Journalist’s Vera Tan about press freedom in Azerbaijan and why she continues to write despite the risks.

Global Journalist: How did you know you wouldn’t be able to return to Azerbaijan safely?

Geybullayeva: I started to get mentioned in the news a lot more than I should have been mentioned. I was mostly labeled as a traitor because of my work [writing about] , and also because of my work with Agos.

Global Journalist: When did you start fearing for your life?

Geybullayeva: It was October [2014] when I received my first death threat – he told me [online] about the number of days I had left, he told me the exact location I’d be buried. I obviously realized that going home was out of the question because when you’re labeled a traitor, it’s quite a serious accusation…You realize that once you get labeled and such, it’s not really safe to go back, especially when a lot of people were ending up in prison at the time.

GJ: How long did the threats continue?

Geybullayeva: To be honest with you, some of them I stopped reading. It got to me, psychologically. And to me, what really pissed me off was when it went from being against me to against my family. People started calling my mom a whore, people started calling my father a traitor. When someone calls you a whore or a bitch, or imagines the many ways that want to rape you, that’s one thing, but when this imagination extends to your parents and the things that they imagine doing to your mother, for instance, I really think that’s borderline. At least it was for me.

GJ: Your brother has been threatened due to your work. How has that made you feel?

Geybullayeva: I try not to blame myself for the pressure and the stuff that he had to go through… But of course I do feel the responsibility… I so very clearly remember our conversation when – this was last summer – he called me yet again, and he was yelling on the phone, telling me how sick and tired he is of my writing and my work and then he told me that I should publicly apologize for my mistakes. He called my work a mistake… And it got to me.

But after that, I thought, no. I’m not going to write anything anywhere and to apologize for anything because I haven’t done anything wrong. And if it really does bother him, then I decided to tell him that he should disown me, that he should publicly disown me… And I think that sort of pushed his boundaries to actually realize that I am actually family.

GJ: How is it to live in Turkey knowing you can’t go back to Azerbaijan?

Geybullayeva: You really start understanding what freedom really is and what it really means in various circumstances. It makes me feel really sad because I cannot travel back to Azerbaijan, because I cannot visit my father’s grave, and I can’t visit my friends, but it definitely gives me the space and opportunity to do the work that I do.

GJ: Why do you still continue the work that you do?

Geybullayeva: I’ve always felt privileged. I’ve had the comfort of life that not everyone in Azerbaijan had… and I feel like I’m returning a favor to my upbringing by trying to tell the stories of those who did not or do not or will not have the same privileges… I sometimes wonder if it actually is making a difference, because to me it’s sometimes feels like it’s actually making matters worse, and more people get arrested, but then I also realize that if we keep silent then it’s even worse.

Already I see that people don’t know much about Azerbaijan. That is despite all the advancing that’s taking place in the sidelines, so what if people like me shut up? What if we stop doing the work that we do? Then what? I think that would not be me doing justice to my peers back home. Because I owe them at least a fight.

DENMARK Following Turkish threats of vandalism, genocide postponed the inauguration of the memorial

May 19, 2015 By administrator

The memorial to the genocide of the Armenians on the occasion of its 100th anniversary, which was inaugurated in Copenhagen (Denmark) 23 May was postponed in September writes the Danish website thelocal.dk. The memorial from a height of 9 meters that had to be exposed on site Kultorvet of the Danish capital will not be exposed as a result of vandalism threats. Turkey, through its ambassador in Copenhagen has strongly protested against the erection of this memorial. Given the risk of vandalism, Ambassador of Armenia in Copenhagen Hratchia Aghadjanian postponed the inauguration.

Krikor Amirzayan

NYT reveals threats against Turkish reporter as pro-gov’t media turn her into target

September 19, 2014 By administrator

ISTANBUL

The New York Times revealed Sept. 19 that its reporter Ceylan Yeğinsu, who wrote a striking story on the recruitment efforts of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) at the heart of the Turkish capital Ankara earlier this week, has been receiving ‘messages that threaten her safety.’

After her report was published, Yeğinsu not only received strong reactions from officials, including President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, but was also targeted by the pro-government media, with a number of newspapers publishing her picture on their front page in a bid to trigger public outrage.

The executive director of the New York Times, Dean Bacquet, expressed concern about Yeğinsu’s safety, adding that the American broadsheet acknowledged that the picture accompanying the story of Erdoğan with Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu during Friday prayers was misleading.

“Despite this published correction, some Turkish authorities and media outlets have mounted a coordinated campaign to intimidate and attack the motives of the reporter who wrote the story. She has been sent thousands of messages that threaten her safety,” Bacquet said in a written statement Sept. 18.

“It is unacceptable for one of our journalists to be targeted in this way. We expect the Turkish authorities to work to ensure the safety of our journalists working legally in the country,” he added.

Bacquet also emphasized that the article did not imply “that President Erdoğan supported ISIL or condoned the recruitment of ISIL fighters in Turkey.”

Yeğinsu herself, a former reporter for the Hürriyet Daily News, responded to criticism of the piece by stressing that she was not responsible for the choice of the picture. Both the New York Times and Yeğinsu have said they stand behind the report.

Pro-government media campaign

Several pro-government outlets and journalists, however, have strongly denounced “bias” in the New York Times report, though none have published reports that could eventually contradict its findings.

One of the most virulent pro-government media outlets, daily Takvim, published Yeğinsu’s picture on its Sept. 18 front page, even printing information about her family. Her picture appeared next to a larger one of President Erdoğan, whose denunciation of the report as “shameless, immoral, treason,” were highlighted using a huge font size.

Another newspaper close to the government, daily Akşam, also published Yeğinsu’s picture on its front page, alongside headline stating, “The perception-shaping operation was homemade,” in reference to the fact that Yeğinsu is a Turkish citizen.

In its Sept. 19 edition, daily Takvim published testimonies from shop owners in the Hacı Bayram neighborhood of Ankara – where the original story was researched – who denied that ISIL recruitment could have happened there. The story was also picked up by daily Sabah, which is owned by the same group.

In addition to all of this, pro-government columnists and commentators added fuel to the fire on social media, with many quoting Turkish officials as saying Turkey would “never allow” such a thing on its own soil.

With the pro-government media becoming increasingly strident in Turkey, the list of journalists who have been personally targeted without their reports being properly debated is growing.

The Turkish government had also reacted strongly to the international media coverage of Gezi protests last year, particularly slamming CNN and BBC for broadcasting the demonstrations live. Since then, Turkish officials have formed a habit of denouncing reports they dislike or disagree with, particularly since criticism in the international press about the restriction of freedoms in Turkey rose, such as when access to Twitter and YouTube was temporarily banned.

Turkey: threats to the first Turkish film on the bottom of the Armenian Genocide (Video)

August 16, 2014 By administrator

Armenian Life Magazine 1429 – Writing

August 13, 2014

The German-Turkish director Fatih Akin and the Armenian-Turkish bilingual weekly Agos received death threats sent by nationalist Turks, Agos who last month published an interview with the director about his new film. The content of the messages, massive support for making the threats and the passivity of the authorities are grim illustration of the current atmosphere in Turkey. Death threats are an omen for next year, the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide.

Akin – author of the films “Head On”, “Crossing the Bridge: The Sound of Istanbul” and “Soul Kitchen” – was awarded on July 30 a long interview about Agos “The Cut”, his new focus on film Armenian Genocide. The interview, which was met with great interest has interesting revelations.

For example, Akin said he thought a film about the life of the Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, the former editor of the newspaper Agos who was assassinated in 2007, but no actor he approached had agreed to hold the role.

Akin subsequently began work on a new project: the story of a Turkish-Armenian who, having escaped the massacre of 1915, began the search for her daughters worldwide. Akin wrote the script in German, but was later determined to filming in English. He asked this participation Mardik Martin, an Armenian American and Iraqi writer roots that contributed to the scripts of films by Martin Scorsese. According to Akin, Martin has not only translated; he modified and given the intensity to the script.

The film – with French actor of Algerian origin Tahar Rahim and Turkish Bartu Kucukcaglayan actor – was shot in Jordan, Cuba, Canada, Malta and Germany. His first showing is scheduled for next Venice Film Festival and only the trailer is now available.

Akin told Agos he did not consider “The Cut” as a film about the Armenian Genocide, but as an adventure film. He said not to have had to do so politically motivated and that he hoped the film “will receive the welcome in Turkey and should be projected in large rooms.”

Akin was aware that the fate of his film would not be the same as that given to others in Turkey, even if it is not based on the theme of genocide. “The Cut”, after all, is the first film of a director that addresses the Turkish 1915 events The filmmaker, however, remains optimistic in his view, the film in Turkey will be without problems. “I trust; Turkish people, myself included, is ready for this kind of movie, “he told Agos.

However, since the publication of this interview, a tweet from the Pan Association – Turkist Turanian Akin showed he may have been too optimistic.

We read in the message: “The process is triggered under the direction of the newspaper Agos, for the screening of Fatih Akin on the so-called Armenian Genocide ‘The Cut’ in Turkey. ‘The Cut’ is the first link in the chain of a plot to gain recognition by Turkey of the Armenian Genocide lies before 2015 … and we will not allow it to be screened in Turkey. We openly threaten the newspaper Agos, Armenian fascists and complacent intellectuals. This film will be screened in any room in Turkey. We follow the development of our white wearing berets in the Azeri golden banner. We will see if you are able! “.

The metaphor of “white cap” becomes a sinister message. Samast, the alleged murderer of Hrant Dink, wore a white beret when he shot in the neck Dink outside the offices of Agos in central Istanbul, 19 January 2007 The white cap has since become the frequently raised by participants in the demonstrations racist and anti-Armenian nationalist symbol.

The threat of Turanian Association was relayed on social media by the messages of support from other ultranationalist groups.

The events that followed showed that the Turkish authorities have learned nothing of the murder of Hrant Dink, who was preceded by similar threats. According to the Turkish penal code, these messages is a criminal offense for many reasons, from the threats they have to hold a hate speech. Prosecutions against the perpetrators do not imply that complaints are filed by the victims; the law gives prosecutors the power to initiate criminal proceedings. Unfortunately, hate speech against minorities retains no attention of the prosecutor.

In an advertisement in Al-Monitor reaction, the editor of Agos Robert Koptas said the publication had become accustomed to receiving threats, given the passivity of the authorities as the norm. “For us, the situation is not extraordinary. And the fact that the situation is not extraordinary in itself is an indication of the atmosphere in which we live “Has he said.

“We had to once again make a complaint, despite the fact that the police and justice were supposed to have been seized with these offenses. We are not asking for special protection, but we are a publication whose editor-in-chief was murdered outside his own office. Also, the threats we receive are supposed to have a special significance for the police and prosecutors, “said Koptas. He added that no government official had called him about the threats or make any public statement on this.

Threats indicate that some tensions and turbulence is expected in Turkey in 2015, the centennial of the Armenian Genocide. The debate on the Armenian Genocide in Turkey became free as it has ever been. The commemorative events are now held across Turkey on 24 April, Genocide Remembrance Day. Although the latest incident shows that ultranationalist groups are on alert, the anniversary approaching.

Threats against Akin’s film shows that some circles in Turkey have lost none of their intolerance and emboldened by the failure to act of justice, feel free to take who they want. It seems that no lesson from the past have not been learned.

Gilbert Béguian translation Armenews