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An explosion rips through an ammunition depot in southeast Turkey, causing a fire, local media report.
Firefighters and more than 100 ambulances have been deployed to the area in Diyarbakir Province.
The ammunition storeroom which went up in flames on Wednesday is owned by Diyarbakir Police Special Operations Department.
The cause of the explosion is not known. An investigation into the incident is underway.
There are so far no reports of any casualties or injuries.
source: presstv
One assailant was killed and one was wounded on Sept. 15 during clashes between security forces and members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in various neighborhoods in the eastern province of Van, the Hurriyet Daily News reports quoting the local governor’s office has stated.
PKK members blocked roads in the Karşıyaka, Yenimahalle and Şabaniye neighborhoods with barricades. Locals living in the neighborhoods informed security forces of the incidents as armored police vehicles deployed to the areas were targeted with hidden bombs, Molotov cocktails and long-barreled weapons.
Meanwhile, PKK members responded to the intervention of the security forces by firing their weapons and using improvised explosives. One assailant, wearing a mask and identified as V.B., was killed while another identified as M.İ. was wounded, the statement said.
The governor’s office said judicial and administrative investigations into the incidents were continuing.
Signature campaign for changing the preventive measure with respect to Abdullah Demirbaş, the former mayor of the municipality of Sur in the Turkish city of Diyarbakir, has kicked off in Turkey.
The signature collection in the Internet was launched by Demirbaş’s daughter, who stressed that her father suffers from a serious illness. Now he is in prison, and his health issues have exacerbated.
His daughter has asked all people of good will to take part in the campaign.
Demirbaş was arrested on 8 August 2015 on charge of his membership to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party.
Demirbaş installed an Armenian sign reading “Welcome” at the entrance to Diyarbakir, published the stories of the Armenian writer Hovhannes Tumanyan in Armenian, organized courses of the Armenian language in the city, installed the first monument commemorating the Armenian Genocide in Turkey and contributed to the restoration and further preservation of the Armenian church of St. Giragos in Diyarbakir.
To take part in the campaign, click HERE.
More are approaching the new legislative elections in Turkey, the pressure intensifies on the media opposed to power. So that not only Twitter was suspended again, but more serious, 15 pro-Kurdish TV channels broadcast would be prohibited.
These attacks on freedom of expression are part of the line of deposits complaint by the authorities against journalists, such as against the Chief Editor of Today’s Zaman, Bulent Kenes.
If the AKP were to regain the majority in the elections of November, one wonders about the emergency powers that could bring Recep Tayyip Erdogan when we see what is happening in Turkey, especially against the Kurdish population. A president who, in his wildest dreams think the rally the people to his standard by shining against the Kurds.
According to a survey Metropoll, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) would get 41.4% of the vote, against 40.9% in June, while the Republican People’s Party (CHP Kemalist left) would gain 2.3% compared to the elections of June 6, with 25%. The Nationalist Action Party (MHP) would increase his score with 15.3% (against 16.3% in June) and the Peoples Democratic Party (HDP pro-Kurdish) remains at 13% (13.1% in June).
I
YEREVAN. – 8 violations have been recorded on the Armenian-Turkish border since 2015, as reported by the press-service of Federal Security Service of Russia in Armenia.
“5 out of 8 violations were initiated by Turkey, and 3 by Armenia,” the press-service reports.
According to the source, all the violations were of a household nature. Weapons and ammunition weren’t discovered in any of these cases.
In contrast, in 2014 Russian bodyguards detained over 60 state border trespassers and more than 20 violators of the border regime. The number of people whose documents were considered faulty at the border crossing exceeded 1500. Over 250 people weren’t allowed to cross the border for different violations. 75 units of cold weapons and contraband of over 20 million AMD were seized.
Cizre is a district of Şırnak province with a population of 140,000.
It is situated at the epicenter of the geographical area Kurds call Botan, a region where Kurdish identity has always been strong. It has a long history of resistance that can be traced back to the 19th century. A number of Kurdish uprisings began there. For this reason, many operations have been conducted in this area. Cizre is a residential area at the skirts of Mount Cudi. It is also the crossing to Iraqi Kurdistan. For this reason, it has served as a venue where Kurdish rioters were based. Mount Cudi is also currently one of the places where PKK guerrillas are located. It is not easy to maintain military control there. State pressure and military operations have not brought Cizre closer to the state. On the contrary, these measures have pushed the district away.
The interim government, in which the Justice and Development Party (AKP) is dominant, imposed a blockade upon Cizre for eight consecutive days. The state shut down all channels of communication, and thousands of members of security forces were deployed to the city. No information about what was happening in the district was transmitted during this period lasting over a week, and even delegations from civil society groups, and from the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and the Republican People’s Party (CHP) were denied entry. Also prohibited from entering were HDP ministers serving in the interim government; they were harassed by security forces who upheld the blockade.
And this operation was called an operation to purge Cizre of terrorists. The state invaded this town by deploying 5,000 military and security officers to “purge” 100-150 “terrorists.”
However, terrible news has been reported, in spite of the strong blockade. Children were killed. They were kept in freezers because their parents were not allowed to bury them. A number of civilians died. Sick patients were not taken to the hospital and people were unable to maintain adequate food supplies because of the curfew.
But according to Ahmet Davutoğlu, the prime minister of the interim government, not a single civilian was harmed during this huge military operation. Davutoğlu made such statements, which were quickly proven wrong. It is not possible to understand why he does so.
EU Minister Ali Haydar Konca (an HDP deputy) made this statement, which refuted Davutoğlu’s claim: “It is evident that there is wide-scale destruction in Cizre, where more than 20 people have died and 50 are wounded. Even in times of war, the dead are buried and the wounded are taken to hospitals. We could not do this in Cizre. It saddens me deeply to see those images. The bodies of children were kept in freezers for days. This is not something we would like to see in this country.”
The news reports and photos from Cizre taken after the blockade reveal the sad truth. In the days to come, hidden truths will be further revealed when the stories of human beings are told. The truth will be revealed, despite efforts by the pro-government media and the AKP. In Cizre, the state fought against the people, not “terrorists.”
It is not possible to establish domination in Cizre, Botan and Kurdistan by relying on the logic and practice of war. Please read the first paragraph of this column to better understand this.
Cizre has gained a symbolic meaning in reference to the strategy of inciting chaos that the AKP calls the fight against terror. By reliance on this logic, it is not possible to take Cizre into the framework of unity and solidarity. You may approach Cizre and the Kurds by offering a real peace to them. But the AKP is devastating the basis of this peace.
Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was shot dead by an ultranationalist teenager outside his office in İstanbul on Jan. 19, 2007. (Photo: Today’s Zaman)
Engin Dinç, the head of the National Police Department’s Intelligence Unit who led the Trabzon Intelligence Unit at the time of the murder of Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in 2007, said in recent testimony to the İstanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office that the intelligence on Dink’s murder was passed to the İstanbul Police Department in February 2006.
Today’s Zaman learned that Dinç, who is a key suspect in the murder trial of Dink, gave his testimony before the İstanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office secretly and revealed that they received the intelligence for a probable assassination of Dink in Trabzon, which was sent to the İstanbul police in a letter numbered 027248 on Feb. 17, 2006. “I also phoned the chief of the Intelligence Unit of the İstanbul Police Department about the intelligence,” Dinç said in his testimony.
However, former İstanbul Police Chief Celalettin Cerrah and former İstanbul Police Department Intelligence Unit Chief Ahmet İlhan Güler stated in their testimonies before the court during the trial in December 2014 that they had not received any intelligence about Dink’s assassination before the murder in 2007.
Three police officers — Ercan Demir, Özkan Mumcu and Muhittin Zenit — who worked under Dinç in the Intelligence Unit of the Trabzon Police Department were arrested in January as part of an expanded probe into Dink’s murder. All three police officers had said in their testimonies that Dinç was the highest authority at the Trabzon Police Department’s Intelligence Unit, adding that the intelligence reports about Dink had been prepared by Dinç.
Former Trabzon Police Chief Reşat Altay, summoned by Prosecutor Yusuf Hakkı Doğan to testify in Dink’s murder trial in December 2014, named Dinç during his testimony. According to media reports, Altay said Dinç had never presented intelligence reports which warned that a possible attack would target Dink, before the reports were sent to the National Police Department. Altay reportedly said, “Apart from the reports, I also do not remember Dinç ever briefing me with any intelligence that Yasin Hayal was preparing to attack Dink.”
Despite a collection of testimonies pointing the finger at Dinç and requests from the lawyers of the family of murdered journalist Dink, the prosecutor conducting the ongoing murder probe decided not to summon Dinç to testify. He was also promoted and has been the chief of the National Police Department’s Intelligence Unit since April 2013.
Dink was shot and killed by an ultranationalist teenager in 2007. The hitman, Ogün Samast, and 18 others were brought to trial. Since then, the lawyers for the Dink family and the co-plaintiffs in the case have presented evidence indicating that Samast did not act alone. Another suspect, Yasin Hayal, was given life in prison for inciting Samast to commit murder.
The retrial started in September 2014, when the İstanbul 5th High Criminal Court complied with a ruling from the Supreme Court of Appeals in May 2013 overturning a lower court’s ruling that acquitted the suspects in the Dink murder case of charges of forming a terrorist organization. This decision paved the way for the trial of public officials on charges of voluntary manslaughter.
Referring to Erhan Tuncel, an informant and a key suspect who is accused of initiating efforts to have Dink murdered, Dinç said he met Tuncel in his office in Trabzon and asked him to convince Hayal to give up the idea of the assassination.
Separate investigations related to Dink’s murder, including investigations in İstanbul and Trabzon, had previously not been merged in spite of the demands of the Dink family’s lawyers. The investigations were finally combined toward the end of last year.
As part of the same investigation, two former heads of the National Police Department’s Intelligence Unit — Sabri Uzun and Ramazan Akyürek — and a former police chief, Ali Fuat Yılmazer, have testified as suspects.
BY EMRE USLU,
The state never views the youth as something that should be left alone in Turkey. Instead, it sees the manipulation of young people by groups that it does not control as a threat to national security. For this reason, it does not want to leave young people alone.
In particular, the control of nationalist young people by the state is of critical importance because they can be easily manipulated to comply with the state’s priorities. In addition, because nationalism has never been independent of the state, the state breeds nationalist youth groups. It has to do this.
In the Cold War era, young people were used against communists in Turkey. Then, they were used against Kurds and religious groups. Ergenekon, on the other hand, used young people against minorities and non-Muslims. However, the perception of nationalism by the state changed in the era of the Justice and Development Party (AKP). Because the AKP defines itself as a nationalist party, it needed a structure to control the nationalist support base.
Particularly in the Kurdish settlement process, they needed a political association to absorb possible reactions from already existing youth organizations and groups including the Nationalist Movement Party’s (MHP) youth organization Ülkü Ocakları and the Grand Unity Party’s (BBP) group, Alperen Ocakları. For this reason, they founded Ottoman Hearths (Osmanlı Ocakları) in parallel to these two groups. The intelligence service was allegedly behind this initiative. It should be noted that this association was founded when the settlement process was started. The goal of this association was to create a youth structure in consistent with the definition of nationalism of the AKP.
This is why the Ottoman Hearths association was founded. They needed a youth structure that could be manipulated by the palace and the AKP to make sure that the MHP would not be influential among nationalist young people. This parallel nationalist structure would address nationalist sentiments among people. If nationalism is on the rise, the associations would take to the streets to alleviate the reaction.
For AKP, the Ottoman Hearths project was risk-free. If you look at the political approach of AKP figures, you realize that they always hide behind others to attain their goals. If things go badly, they blame those who are on the frontline; if thing go well, they take the whole credit.
They hid behind the Hizmet movement during the fight against Ergenekon. They declared themselves as in charge of the process when things were going well. And when things started to go badly, they blamed the Hizmet movement. It is possible to cite other examples. The Ottoman Hearths project is a reflection of this logic. The members act like nationalists; they use their symbols and gestures. This way, their vandalism and violence is attributed to the MHP, but they also manipulate the rise of nationalist sentiment and serve as a shield for the AKP.
This so-called nationalist parallel organization is used to channel nationalist support for the AKP when things go well. But when things go badly, they argue that they have no affiliation with the AKP.
For this reason, the Ottoman Hearths branches — which have up until recently acted as extensions of the AKP — have started to make statements after their provocations that they have no organic tie with that party because they fear that the AKP would lose support if it became evident that it was the AKP that is responsible for the turmoil on the streets.
In addition, because of the trauma associated with the Gezi protests, the AKP believed that it needed an association to take control of the streets. It thought it should be influential on the streets because groups it did not like may take to the streets in case they did not. Ottoman Hearths would play a function similar to the role Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s “shabihas” have been playing in potential street movements.
In sum, the Ottoman associations were founded to serve the AKP in three respects:
1- To undermine the image of the MHP as a supporter of nationalism
2- To play a function similar to the shabihas to defend the streets in possible street protests
3- To absorb the rise of the nationalist tide.
AP photo
BANGKOK – The Associated Press
A key suspect in last month’s bombing at a Bangkok shrine that killed 20 people has fled to Turkey, Thai police said on Sept. 14.
Police had previously said the man, carrying a Chinese passport in the name Abudureheman Abudusataer, may have directed the Aug. 17 bombing of the Erawan Shrine. Investigations revealed that he left Thailand on Aug. 16 for Bangladesh, and police speculated that he might have gone to China.
However, national police spokesman Prawut Thavornsiri said that information gathered by Thai police and Bangladeshi officials showed that the man departed Bangladesh’s capital, Dhaka, on Aug. 30 and traveled to Istanbul as his final destination, via New Delhi and Abu Dhabi.
“He departed Dhaka on Aug. 30 for Delhi by Jet Airways,” Prawut said. “From Delhi, he continued his travel to Abu Dhabi, and from Abu Dhabi he traveled on Aug. 31 to Istanbul. This is his final destination. It’s clear.”
This bolstered the theory that those behind the blast are Uighurs from the Chinese region of Xinjiang who have close ties to Turkey.
After weeks of demurring, Thailand has suggested that those behind the blast may have been from a gang involved in smuggling Uighurs. But others speculate they may be separatists or Islamist extremists angry that Thailand repatriated more than 100 Uighurs to China in July.
Uighurs complain of oppression by the Chinese government, and some advocate turning Xinjiang into a separate Uighur state.
Thai efforts to identify the members of the network believed responsible for the bombing continued on Sept. 13, when police in Bangkok raided an apartment that they suspected was linked to a bombing suspect. Police said no bomb-making materials were found in the apartment, which is in a building that serves as a hostel for women. Thai media reported that the two women tenants and a guest were taken away for questioning.
Two other key suspects are also in custody, charged with possession of illegal explosives. One of them was captured from an apartment on the outskirts of Bangkok where police also discovered bomb-making material.
The other was caught near the border between Thailand and Cambodia, and police said his fingerprints were found on a container with explosive material confiscated from the apartment.
Also on Sept. 14, Malaysia’s police chief announced that a Pakistani and two Malaysians have been detained in connection with the Bangkok bombing.
Inspector General Khalid Abu Bakar told reporters that the three were detained a few days ago following a tip-off by Thai authorities. He said one of the Malaysians is a woman.
Among those who died in the blast were five Malaysians from one family. Many of the victims were foreigners as the shrine is a popular destination for tourists and Thais alike.
Khalid did not give details or say where in Malaysia the three were detained, when they will be formally charged, or what the charges would be. He said Malaysian police will investigate and work with Thai authorities on the detainees.
Thai police say the man who may have actually planted the bomb may have fled across Thailand’s southern border to Malaysia, but Khalid refused to speculate on that.
Prawut, the Thai police spokesman, said his department had told the Malaysians that some suspects might have escaped to Malaysia.
Malaysian police then investigated and arrested suspects who are allegedly involved in illegal human smuggling and they might have some information, Prawut said.
“However, we haven’t had any confirmation. … As a preliminary step, they have arrested suspects who are allegedly involved in illegal human smuggling. Whether they are involved in our bombing incident or not we will have to wait and see,” he said.
September/14/2015