Category: World

Orhan İnandı, a Turkish-Kyrgyz educator who was kidnapped in Kyrgyzstan on May 31 and illegally brought to Turkey by the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) in July, revealed during a court hearing that a statement previously given to the police was false because he had spoken under torture by security officers, Turkish Minute reported on Thursday, citing the Demirören news agency.

İnandı, who testified as a witness in the trial of Şükrü Yıldırır on Thursday, said during a hearing at the İstanbul 24th High Criminal Court that a statement he had given to the police after he was illegally brought to Turkey accusing Yıldırır of managing Gülen movement activities in İstanbul’s Beşiktaş district was false due to being taken under torture.

“I don’t recognize the defendant. I don’t remember what I said. I had given my statement under torture. I don’t remember the name [Şükrü Yıldırır]. I consider FETÖ to be a faith-based movement. I don’t see it as a terrorist organization,” İnandı said.

According to Demirören, the court on Thursday ruled to release Yıldırır.

FETÖ is a derogatory term coined by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) government to refer to the Gülen movement as a terrorist organization.

Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement, a faith-based group that focuses on science education, volunteerism, community involvement, social work and interfaith and intercultural dialogue that is inspired by the teachings of Muslim preacher Fethullah Gülen, since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-prime minister Erdoğan, his family members and his inner circle.

Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. Erdoğan intensified the crackdown on the movement following a coup attempt on July 15, 2016, that he accused Gülen of masterminding. Gülen and the movement strongly deny involvement in the abortive putsch or any terrorist activity.

Erdoğan on July 4 acknowledged that İnandı was abducted by Turkish spies and brought to Turkey, praising their efforts in the rendition. İnandı, who had lived in Kyrgyzstan for nearly 30 years, was arrested on July 12 on charges of membership in a terrorist organization due to his links to the movement.

Based on the state-run Anadolu news agency’s video of İnandı with a Turkish flag on either side while covering his rendition on July 4, Solidarity with OTHERS, a nongovernmental organization that mainly consists of political exiles from Turkey, claimed the educator had been subjected to torture.

Reyhan İnandı, the educator’s wife, confirmed the claims, saying that her husband’s right arm had been broken in three places by Turkish security officers. She added that İnandı hadn’t received timely medical treatment and as a result hadn’t been able to use his right arm for nearly five months. SCF

Representatives of Turkish schools in Pakistan have filed a petition with the Pakistani Interior Ministry contesting the transfer of their schools to a Turkish government-run foundation, marking the first step in their legal battle, Turkish Minute reported.

A group of representatives of the private PakTurk International Schools and Colleges (PakTurk) demanded in their petition that the schools be removed from the list of banned institutions in Pakistan and restored to their rightful owners.

The group received help from London Advocacy (LA), which advises victims of human rights violations on how to fight their cases in court and in the media.

In December 2018 the PakTurk schools, run by volunteers affiliated with the Gülen movement, were listed as “institutions supporting terrorism” by the Pakistani government due to pressure from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The Pak Turk International Çağ Educational Foundation (ICEF), which was running the schools, was transferred to the Turkish government-run Maarif Foundation.

Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by Turkish Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-Prime Minister Erdoğan, his family members, and his inner circle.

Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. He intensified the crackdown on the movement following an abortive putsch in July 2016.

The representatives, consisting of former teachers and executives of the PakTurk schools, also launched a website as well as a donation campaign on GoFundMe to secure funds for their legal battle and to reach out to a broader audience.

Going live on Monday, the donation campaign is expected to raise £30,000 for various projects.

Murat Ercan, a former school administrator, said their appeal was a bit delayed due to official procedures but that they are ready to pursue their fight in the face of a negative response from the ministry and to elevate it to the highest legal authorities in Pakistan.

Noting that looking for a legal solution to politically motivated decisions wouldn’t be enough, Ercan indicated that they have launched a website and opened a YouTube channel and social media accounts in an effort to raise international awareness of their struggle.

“We are planning to implement the projects mentioned on our website by the end of 2022,” Ercan said, adding that they need support from former workers and stakeholders of the PakTurk schools.

As part of these projects, the group is planning to file cases with the High Court and Supreme Court of Pakistan, publish books based on material collected on the website, organize social media campaigns, create a short documentary and organize panel discussions and conferences. SCF

Democracy and Progress Party (DEVA) leader and former Turkish deputy prime minister Ali Babacan said in an interview aired on TELE1 on Saturday that the Cabinet, which comprises members of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), signs blank papers for President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to fill in as he pleases to be published as Cabinet decisions.

“Blank pieces of paper would be signed by the ministers, and these would be filled in later. They would then be published in the Official Gazette with President Erdoğan’s signature,” Babacan said of the time before his resignation from the AKP. “So it was really up to one signature.”

Babacan said state of emergency decrees issued following a coup attempt in 2016 were also prepared in this manner. He added that nobody would confess to the practice, but Cabinet members of the time would instead confirm it off the record.

Following Babacan’s revelation, Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu, a lawmaker from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), urged him to disclose the Cabinet members who went along with the practice.

“Mr. Ali Babacan revealed a big scandal. Can one call a minister signing a blank piece of paper, a minister? Look at this [mess]! Decrees that ruined the lives of millions were prepared with a yes-man attitude,” Gergerlioğlu tweeted, adding that the names of the ministers who signed blank papers should be publicized.

Turkey has been going through a series of political and financial crises. According to critics there have been gross human rights violations and a regression in freedom of speech during the AKP’s 19-year rule.

A 31-year-old man who fled to Germany in search of a safer life after being sentenced to prison in Turkey for alleged links to the Gülen movement died of a heart attack on October 1, Bold Medya reported.

İbrahim Kılınç had no pre-existing conditions. He was the father of a 4-year-old boy and had arrived on August 24 in Germany, where he was living in a refugee camp. According to his family Kılınç had suffered a mental breakdown while in pretrial detention and told them he was “exhausted from the suffering.”

Kılınç was a public servant working for the Ministry of Finance but was summarily dismissed from his job by a government decree. He was arrested in March 2017, and his then-pregnant wife was detained shortly thereafter.

Kılınç was accused of using ByLock, an encrypted messaging app now banned in the country. Turkey considers ByLock, once widely available online, a secret tool of communication among supporters of the faith-based Gülen movement since a coup attempt on July 15, 2016 despite the lack of any evidence that ByLock messages were related to the abortive putsch, leading to the arrest of thousands who were using it.

Kılınç was handed down a six year, 10 month sentence and released while his case was pending before the Supreme Court of Appeals. According to his family, Kılınç was under immense psychological stress in prison.

“Nobody cares about us in there,” he told his family. “They wouldn’t care if we died. We asked for a doctor, but he came hours later. Our life has no value.”

Kılınç’s wife said her husband was also very stressed after he was released from prison. She said they crossed the border with Greece in November 2020, from where they tried to reach Germany, but the journey was very tiring. “He told me he felt exhausted, and sometimes he felt like his heart would stop,” she said. “He fainted once in Greece, and he was scared about his health.”

Kılınç’s wife said they had not had a happy day since the coup attempt. She said they were subjected to immense suffering, and their life as asylum seekers had also been exhausting. “I believe all that suffering could have led to the heart attack,” she said.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by Turkish Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-Prime Minister Erdoğan, his family members and his inner circle.

Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. He intensified the crackdown on the movement following the abortive putsch that he accused Gülen of masterminding. Gülen and the movement strongly deny involvement in the coup attempt or any terrorist activity.

Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu said on February 20 that a total of 622,646 people have been the subject of investigation and 301,932 have been detained, while 96,000 others have been jailed due to alleged links to the Gülen movement since the failed coup. The minister said there are currently 25,467 people in Turkey’s prisons who were jailed on alleged links to the movement.

The government also removed more than 130,000 civil servants from their jobs on alleged Gülen links following the coup attempt.

In addition to the thousands who were jailed, scores of other Gülen movement followers had to flee Turkey to avoid the government crackdown. SCF

“The authorities aren’t doing anything to find my son, and I’m tired of waiting,” said Mustafa Tunç, father of Yusuf Bilge Tunç, a former bureaucrat who disappeared in Ankara on August 6, 2019 in broad daylight, leaving no trace behind.

In a tweet Tunç said it has been 26 months since his son disappeared. “I have been waiting to hear something [about my son]. I am tired of waiting and uncertainty,” he said. “Don’t they [government officials] have any faith, beliefs? Why don’t they do anything to find my son?”

Yusuf Bilge Tunç’s car was found in a remote area 45 days after he vanished in Ankara’s GİMAT shopping mall. His family immediately called the police; yet the police showed no real interest in his disappearance. “The police only conducted a crime scene investigation six months after we found the car and contacted them,” said Mustafa Tunç. “We had already removed the car from where we found it so the investigation was really a formality.”

Although the family was afraid he had been abducted, the police dismissed their fears, saying: “He might have fled and left his car behind. Take a look at the CCTV footage. He will return.”

According to Tunç’s father the officials treated his son’s case as a domestic dispute. “They acted as if my son was someone who deserted his wife and child and ran away. We requested that his phone records be examined. After nearly a year, we still have no results from the phone records. My daughter-in-law and I requested that the prosecutor check the city surveillance cameras; however, they refused to look at them. The investigation file contains abundant correspondence among state institutions, revealing no serious effort for a thorough investigation.”

Tunç worked in Turkey’s Undersecretariat for the Defense Industries, the government agency responsible for defense procurement, and he was summarily fired with an executive decree after a July 15, 2016 coup attempt.

Nearly 30 people have reportedly been abducted by Turkish intelligence since 2016. Most of the abductions targeted members of the Gülen movement, a faith-based group inspired by Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-Prime Minister Erdoğan, his family members and his inner circle.

Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the Gülen movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. Erdoğan intensified the crackdown on the movement following a coup attempt on July 15, 2016, that he accused Gülen of masterminding. Gülen and the movement strongly deny involvement in the abortive putsch or any terrorist activity.

Many of the abductees mysteriously reappeared in police custody in Ankara after six to nine-month absences. Apparently intimidated, most of them had kept their silence after their reappearance.

Speaking at a court hearing in February 2020, one of the abductees, Gökhan Türkmen, revealed that he had been held incommunicado at a black site in Ankara run by Turkey’s intelligence agency and subjected to severe torture during his 271-day stay. Türkmen was the object of threats and was sexually harassed and abused during his enforced disappearance. He also alleged that he was visited in prison and threatened no less than six times by officials who introduced themselves as intelligence officers, pressuring him to retract his allegations of abduction and torture made at the February hearing. SCF

Pro-opposition media outlets Halk TV and the Sözcü daily faced harsh criticism for using government’s discourse about the arrest of Ayşe Özdoğan, 34, an end-stage cancer patient who was arrested on Saturday to serve a prison sentence on a terrorism conviction, the Stockholm Center for Freedom reported on Tuesday.

Sözcü used the pro-government İhlas News Agency’s (İHA) report on Özdoğan’s arrest, which falsely claimed that Özdoğan was found after “diligent police work.” Özdoğan has not been in hiding and has frequently posted on Twitter about her illness.

Halk TV, on the other hand, initially used the same story on its website with the headline “Big sister [in charge of women] of FETÖ [a derogatory term used by the Turkish government to refer to the Gülen movement] in charge of a province has been arrested.”

Halk TV later changed its headline to “Ayşe Özdoğan arrested” and used a more fact-based story, saying Özdoğan was detained at home and arrested by a court.

Özdoğan, a former teacher, was handed down a nine-year, four-month prison sentence for alleged links to the Gülen movement. An appeals court on June 11 upheld her sentence despite severe health problems and a hospital report saying she was not fit to stay in prison.

Her arrest caused an outcry on social media, with people from different backgrounds rallying around the hashtag #AyşeÖzdoğanTutuklanmasın (Don’t arrest Ayşe Özdoğan), which was among the top trending topics on Twitter in Turkey throughout the weekend.

Özdoğan and her husband were detained on April 8, 2019 for alleged links to the Gülen movement, but she was released due to her son’s heart condition. Her husband was sent to prison in southern Antalya province.

Özdoğan developed cancer seven months later and underwent an operation on November 12, 2019. However, she was arrested shortly thereafter, convicted and sentenced to nine years, six months in prison.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-prime minister Erdoğan, his family members and his inner circle.

Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. Erdoğan intensified the crackdown on the movement following a coup attempt on July 15, 2016 that he accused Gülen of masterminding. Gülen and the movement strongly deny involvement in the abortive putsch or any terrorist activity.

Özdoğan’s arrest sparked outrage, and thanks to an online campaign started by human rights defender and People’s Democratic Party (HDP) deputy Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu, she was released pending appeal on December 27, 2019.

It was already too late for her second surgery, however, as the cancer had spread. Özdoğan’s teeth, palate, zygomatic bone and lymph nodes were removed in an emergency operation. Özdoğan lost her ability to see and hear after the operation due to the trauma her facial bones suffered.

In a previous tweet Özdoğan said she could no longer eat solid foods and suffered from a chronic infection in her sinuses, where a tumor was removed. She added that she could not chew or swallow because of the cancer.

“Turkey has become known as a mafia state and the evidence suggests that this is the case, now more than ever,” according to the Global Organized Crime Index 2021, which was published on Tuesday by a global initiative with funding from the US and the EU.

Countries were given a score on a scale of one to 10 in the index, with one the least activity and 10 the highest. With a criminality score of 6.89, Turkey was ranked the 12th worst country of 193 UN member states, worse than Syria, Lebanon and Venezuela.

“The Turkish government often leverages certain criminal markets, such as the gold and oil trade, human smuggling and arms trafficking, for its own benefit and political purpose,” the study said.

The index, published by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime (GI-TOC), provides the first ever assessment of illicit economies in all 193 UN member states.

According to the study, depending on political circumstances and geopolitical relations with other countries, the Turkish government chooses to “either tighten or ease its control over organized criminal activity.”

“State-embedded individuals are thought to be involved in illegally transferring weapons to Salafi-Jihadist groups fighting in Syria and Libya, as well as providing weapons to paramilitary groups in Turkey,” the report said. “Organized crime and state-embedded individuals have extremely strong and complex links, dating back many decades and continuing to today.”

According to the report Turkish organized criminal gangs control the wholesale importation of heroin into Europe. Based on an increase in acetic anhydride seizures, a key precursor for processing morphine into heroin, the report suggested that heroin production is on the rise in Turkey, with laboratories scattered across Istanbul and in eastern provinces at the border.

The report underlined that cooperation between Turkey and the US Drug Enforcement Agency has weakened considerably since 2016, which has damaged the Turkish National Police’s ability to deal with drug trafficking.

The illegal arms trade is also pervasive in Turkey, the study said, with firearm use and arms trafficking on the rise in recent years. Overall, Turkey plays a role as simultaneously a source, transit and destination country to greater or lesser degrees

In terms of human trafficking and smuggling, Turkey is a key player in the transnational markets, according to the report. “Human trafficking, a prominent criminal market in Turkey, is characterized predominantly by trafficking for sexual exploitation and forced labour,” it said. “Human trafficking is concentrated largely in the country’s tourist areas, in metropolitan cities and in cities at the country’s borders.”

The report also highlighted what it considered to be severe concerns regarding the use of extradition processes and requests by the Turkish government as a political tool. “[Turkish government] also engages in illegal renditioning of suspected coup plotters,” the report said. “Concerns have been raised about the Turkish government’s prolific abuse of INTERPOL’s red-notice system to unfairly target journalists, activists and political opponents living abroad.”

In a report published in August 2021, the Stockholm Center for Freedom detailed how the Turkish government, under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has abused INTERPOL in various ways. SCF

In a parliamentary question to Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu, opposition MP Mustafa Yeneroğlu sought information on the whereabouts of Yusuf Bilge Tunç, who went missing 25 months ago and is feared to have been abducted by Turkish intelligence.

Democracy and Progress (DEVA) lawmaker Yeneroğlu asked if the disappearance of Tunç is being investigated properly by security authorities.

Tunç disappeared in Ankara on August 6, 2019 in broad daylight, leaving no trace behind.

Hüseyin Galip Küçüközyiğit, who had been missing since late 2020 and was suspected of being a victim of enforced disappearance, has been recently found and is currently in a prison in Ankara.

Yusuf Bilge Tunç’s father, Mustafa, said he was happy that Küçüközyiğit was finally found but was pained that his son was still missing. “I have been waiting for some news of his whereabouts for 25 months. Will I also be able to hear from him soon?” he asked.

Tunç’s car was found in a remote area 45 days after he vanished in Ankara’s GİMAT shopping mall. His family immediately called the police; yet the police showed no real interest in his disappearance. “The police only conducted a crime scene investigation six months after we found the car and contacted them,” said Mustafa Tunç. “We had already removed the car from where we found it so the investigation was really a formality.”

Although the family was afraid he had been abducted, the police dismissed their fears, saying: “He might have fled and left his car behind. Take a look at the CCTV footage. He will return.”

Tunç worked at Turkey’s Undersecretariat for the Defense Industries, the government agency responsible for defense procurement, and he was summarily fired by an executive decree after a July 15, 2016 coup attempt.

According to rights organizations, enforced disappearances have become worryingly common in Turkey, and most disappearances were not effectively investigated by prosecutors.

Nearly 30 people have reportedly been abducted by Turkish intelligence since 2016. Most of the abductions targeted members of the Gülen movement, a faith-based group inspired by Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-Prime Minister Erdoğan, his family members and his inner circle.

Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the Gülen movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. Erdoğan intensified the crackdown on the movement following a coup attempt on July 15, 2016, that he accused Gülen of masterminding. Gülen and the movement strongly deny involvement in the abortive putsch or any terrorist activity.

Many of the abductees mysteriously reappeared in police custody in Ankara after six to nine-month absences. Apparently intimidated, most of them had kept their silence after their reappearance.

Speaking at a court hearing in February 2020, one of the abductees, Gökhan Türkmen, revealed that he had been held incommunicado at a black site in Ankara run by Turkey’s intelligence agency and subjected to severe torture during his 271-day stay. Türkmen was the object of threats and was sexually harassed and abused during his enforced disappearance. He also alleged that he was visited in prison and threatened no less than six times by officials who introduced themselves as intelligence officers, pressuring him to retract his allegations of abduction and torture made at the February hearing. SCF

Turkish authorities seized the bank account of Nazan Bozkurt, a former public servant summarily fired from her job by an executive decree in 2017, after a TL 281,000 ($32,000) administrative fine was imposed on her for participating in a protest, Turkish media reported.

According to notifications issued by the tax office, Bozkurt was hit with the fine for violating the law on misdemeanors. Speaking to the Bianet news website, Bozkurt said the seizure of her bank account was a surprise as her fines had been cancelled by administrative courts.

“I had 700 different fines cancelled by various courts, however, the tax office still seized my bank account,” she said.

Bozkurt said she would object the seizure with court documents proving the fines had been canceled.

Bozkurt was one of a number of former public servants protesting summary dismissals on Ankara’s Yüksel Street. The protestors demanded reinstatement to their jobs and were detained on August 13, 2020. Bozkurt, along with Acun Karadağ, Alev Şahin, Mehmet Dersulu, Mahmut Konuk and Armağan Özbaş, was arrested 10 days later.

Although Bozkurt was subsequently released and acquitted, she was still not reinstated to her job. Speaking to the Euronews Turkish service, Bozkurt said she had “been subjected to a lot of mistreatment” during and after the protests.

Bozkurt and other purge victims had been protesting human rights violations in Turkey and the purge of public servants since November 2016. They mainly gathered on Ankara’s Yüksel Street, in front of a human rights monument. The protests first started with two dismissed academics, Nuriye Gülmen and Semih Özakça, demanding their jobs back. Both academics later went on a hunger strike and were arrested on the 76th day of their protest. After months of imprisonment, Gülmen and Özakça were finally released.

The monument became a symbol of resistance and demand for justice after other purge victims and activists joined them. Turkish police have notoriously used excessive force against the protestors on Yüksel Street.

A total of 622,646 people have been the subject of investigation and 301,932 have been detained as part of a purge after the coup attempt on July 15, 2016. The government also removed more than 130,000 civil servants from their jobs.

Former public servants were not only fired from their jobs; they were also banned from working again in the public sector and getting a passport. The government also made it difficult for them to work formally in the private sector. Notes were put on the social security database about dismissed public servants to deter potential employers. SCF