Category: World

A municipality run by the ruling Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) in Turkey’s northwestern province of Kocaeli purchased flowers worth 8.6 million liras ($ 1.4 million) in 2018, opposition newspaper Sözcü reported on Saturday.

“The topic we are most concentrated on is just what the municipality of Kartepe did with 8.6 million liras worth of flowers and where they sent them,’’ Sözcü quoted main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) Group Deputy Chairman Hasan Bayrak as saying regarding the expenditure that caused a stir during 2018 budget debates.

The expenditures of AKP municipalities have come under the spotlight and drawn criticism after the Islamist party lost five of Turkey’s most populous provinces to the main opposition CHP in the March 31 local elections. Critics maintain the latest local polls were the AKP’s greatest electoral defeat in its 17 years in power.

Kartepe’s AKP Deputy Mayor Mehmet Filiz released a statement following the report on flower expenditures, indicating an error had been made in municipal records.

“An expenditure for 245 single roses purchased for an event at 3.54 ($ 0.58) liras per unit, was reported as 3540 liras ($ 584) per unit,’’ Filiz said, indicating an erroneous calculation.

CHP dismissed the explanation as the AKP deputy mayor’s attempt to cover up the incident, pointing to many abnormalities in other spendings by the municipality of Kartepe.

The Supreme Federal Court of Brazil on Wednesday ordered the release of Ali Sipahi, who was arrested in April upon a request from Turkey for extradition due to his alleged ties to the faith-based Gülen movement, the pro-government Daily Sabah reported.

Brazil’s Supreme Court ordered Sipahi be taken into custody on March 19. He was detained at Guarulhos Airport in Sao Paulo, where he was operating a restaurant.

It is not clear if Brazil will approve Turkey’s extradition request for Sipahi.

Turkey holds the Gülen movement responsible for a 2016 coup attempt, although the movement strongly denies any involvement.

The Erdoğan government launched a global purge to bring Gülen movement followers back home to face prosecution.

More than 500,000 people in Turkey have been subjected to prosecution on charges  of alleged membership in the movement.turkishminute

The pro-Kurdish party’s new co-mayor of Turkey’s eastern province of Kars said that all office furniture of the municipality were seized as a result of an outstanding debt of the previous far-right nationalist administration, Mezopotamya News Agency reported.

Ayhan Bilgen, who was elected as the new mayor from the predominantly Kurdish Democratic People’s Party (HDP) on March 31, said they have been witnessing waves of seizures since they took office.

The previous Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) left a total debt of more than 338 million lira ($55.8 million) to its successors and all other unlovable assets and vehicles f the municipality was previously seized by payees, Mezopotamya said. This time a company that awaited an outstanding payment of 430,000 lira ($71,000) demanded seizure of the municipality’s office furniture as there were nothing left.

“We talked to the company. We will ask for some time to review the tender. We will bring it to the court along with our complaint over the seizure,” Bilgen told Mezopotamya.

According to Bilgen, there are serious irregularities in the tenders of the previous administration, as  the former mayor on the one hand failed to pay electricity bills and salaries, while at the same time continued to purchase equipment for parks.

Turkey’s Constitutional Court ruled on Thursday that the imprisonment of Kurdish teacher Ayşe Çelik, who during a TV program in 2016 called for an end to clashes between Kurdish militants and Turkish security forces in Diyarbakır and asked authorities to not let children die, was a violation of freedom of expression.

She is expected to be released after the top court’s ruling.

Çelik, an unemployed teacher from the southeastern Turkish province of Diyarbakır, was sentenced to 15 months in April 2017, and an appeals court upheld the sentence in October. She was jailed in April 2018 with her six-month-old daughter, Deran.

In May 2018 she was released from prison and confined to house arrest by the court, following an appeal by her lawyer, Mahsuni Karaman.

Karaman announced from his Twitter account on April 18 that Çelik was jailed again to serve her sentence, which was delayed three times because she was pregnant and had a newborn baby.

An investigation was launched into Çelik after she called in to the popular “Beyaz Show“ on Jan. 8, 2016 and urged authorities to take action to prevent the killing of children in clashes between Turkish security forces and the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

During the TV program, Çelik said: “Are you aware of what’s going on in the country’s east? What’s happening here is misrepresented on television. Don’t stay silent! Please show more sensitivity as human beings! See us, hear us and give us a hand! I’d like to address the teachers who have abandoned their students. How are they going to return there? How are they going to look those innocent children in the eye? What a pity! Don’t let people die. Don’t let children die. Don’t let mothers cry.”

The host of the program, Beyazıt Öztürk, had the audience applaud her by saying: “We are trying our best to make it heard. Your words have been a lesson for us. We will continue to do more. Hopefully your wishes for peace will be realized as soon as possible.”

Following the show, the Diyarbakır Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office launched an investigation into Çelik for “praising terrorism and a terrorist organization,” and the Bakırköy Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office initiated a separate investigation into Öztürk and Çelik on similar charges.

As the dust from the 2019 election begins to settle, it seems controversial Queensland senator Fraser Anning has lost his Senate seat.

Remembered widely as the victim of an egging by teenager Will Connolly, the right-wing politician has failed to secure enough votes to win himself a place in Parliament. ABC Election expert Antony Green made the announcement stating: “Fraser Anning goes back to where he came from … he won’t be in the Parliament”.

Mr Anning’s spot in the upper house has always been tentative, securing his seat last election with just 19 primary votes. He gained office only after One Nation candidate Malcolm Roberts was found to be a dual citizen and was therefore ineligible.

Even though the 69-year old candidate from Fraser Anning’s Conservative National Party won significantly more votes this year, he failed to secure a seat.

The Queenslander has commanded media attention with his right-wing exploits.

Immediately after 50 Muslims worshippers were murdered in a right-wing terror attack in Christchurch in March, Mr Anning published a statement blaming Muslim people for the attack.

This statement was internationally condemned and, at a press conference a short time after, he was hit over the head with an egg by Will Connolly, better known as ‘Egg Boy’.

Mr Anning again came under fire for using taxpayer dollars to fly to Melbourne to attend an extreme far-right rally organised by convicted criminals Blair Cottrell and Neil Erikson.

At this rally attendees were photographed goose-stepping, doing the Nazi salute and displaying swastikas.

While Mr Anning looks be on his way out, other familiar faces may be back with Tasmanian independent Jacqui Lambie and One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts likely to rejoin the upper house.

Both members were removed from parliament due to citizenship issues.

The gap between the ruling party mayoral candidate for Istanbul, Binali Yıldırım, and opposition candidate Ekrem Imamoğlu had dropped to 15,823 votes as of early Monday, with about 90 percent of the invalidated ballots reassessed in the partial recount.

In the March 31 local election, the opposition not only prevailed in a tight race in Istanbul’s financial and cultural hub, it also took control of Ankara, the capital. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which held both cities for decades, contested the results, claiming the elections were tainted.

On Sunday Turkey’s ruling party appealed to the country’s top election authority for a total recount of votes in Istanbul’s 39 districts. Later on Sunday, the election board rejected the AKP’s appeal.

Imamoğlu urged the governing AKP to concede. “I understand that it is not easy to lose (Istanbul) after ruling it for 25 years, but this is what democracy is about,” he said.

British Prime Minister Theresa May claims reaching out to the opposition Labour party was the only way to avoid either leaving the EU with no deal or not leaving at all.

She has just days left to come up with a solution before the latest Brexit date due on April 12, although she has asked Brussels an extension to the June 30.

Leading Brexit supporter, Conservative MP Jacob Rees-Mogg, says the prime minister’s difficulties are of her own making and if the UK is forced to stay in the EU it should make life difficult for Brussels.

“When the multiannual financial framework (next EU budget) comes forward – if we’re still in (EU) – this is our one-in-seven-years opportunity to veto the budget and be really very difficult and I hope that any British PM would take that opportunity”

Talks between May’s ruling Conservatives and Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party are ongoing, with the government insisting a compromise can still be reached. But the mood music coming from the Corbyn camp, while positive, is not quite as optimistic, and they’re saying it’s down to the government to move.

“We are currently waiting for the government to come back to us now to state whether they’re prepared to move on any of their red lines, Labour’s Business Policy Chief Rebecca Long-Bailey told the BBC’s Andrew Marr. “As I say, we had great discussions and we went into a lot of technical details but so far we haven’t seen anything from government that would suggest they are prepared to change any part of the deal going forward.”

Andrea Leadsom: It is appalling to consider another referendum

Leader of the House of Commons Andrea Leadsom discusses her views on a second referendum on The Andrew Marr Show.

If May can agree a compromise deal with Labour then she will have something new to take to an EU summit on April 10. If not, she will have to come up with a new plan if she is to secure an extension from EU leaders, who are losing patience with the United Kingdom.

A Turkish court has ruled for non-prosecution on criminal complaints concerning the murder of air force cadet Murat Tekin during a failed coup attempt in 2016, the Diken news website reported on Friday.

The court justified its decision based on a state of emergency decree adopted after the failed coup that granted impunity to civilians who took to the streets to stop the coup.

Tekin’s lawyer Kübra Aydın revealed that they were not notified of the decision, which was dated November 2018, only to be verbally informed of it during a visit to the prosecutor’s office.

“We’ll object to the decision in the higher criminal courts; however, I do not expect a positive response,” Aydın said. “After that, we’ll lodge an application with the European Court of Human Rights.”

On the day of the coup, 25-year-old Tekin was one of a group of cadets who were deployed to the Bosporus Bridge in İstanbul.

“We are taking you to the most realistic military exercise you’ve ever seen,” commanders at the military school reportedly told them.

His family was only able to retrieve his body 12 days after the incident. His sister claimed his throat was slit by an angry mob, backing up her allegation with an autopsy report that further stated that he was battered, stabbed and asphyxiated before he died.

Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which according to unofficial results lost mayoral races in key cities like Istanbul and Ankara on Sunday, challenges the results, as a defeat will mean losing enormous financial powers, Deutsche Welle Turkish said on Friday. 

According to the unofficial results announced by the electoral board, the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s AKP suffered defeats in five of the six most populous provinces in the country on Sunday. Turkey’s ruling party challenged the results in Istanbul, the country’s biggest city and financial hub, and in Ankara.

For Erdoğan, whose rise to power started when he was elected as the mayor of Istanbul in 1994, the results imply a political weakening according to analysts. Yet, the AKP is also concerned that it will lose the control of what some opponents call “the metropolitan city holdings”, as municipalities in Istanbul and Ankara manage huge financial sources, according to experts.

The 2019 budget of the Istanbul metropolitan municipality is 23.8 billion lira ($4.2 billion) and increases to 35 billion lira ($6.2 billion) when the budgets of the province’s transportation and water distribution authorities are taken into account, DW said. The Istanbul municipality also controls 28 affiliated companies whose total annual turnover is estimated as 24 billion lira ($4.2 billion).

The Ankara metropolitan municipality, which owns 15 companies, has a budget of 14 billion lira ($2.5 billion), while the budget of the western province of Izmir, Turkey’s third largest city, is 5.9 billion lira  ($1 billion).

According to Yalçın Karatepe, an academic at the Ankara University Department of Political Science, the municipalities in key provinces not only control enormous budgets, but are the sole decision makers over construction permits and land allocations. “The companies who win public tenders of those municipalities in time become supporters of the political movement that represents the municipality,” Karatepe said.

Despite losing mayoral races, the AKP still has majority in local councils of Istanbul and Ankara, the legislative bodies of municipalities. Erdoğan on Wednesday called the elected opposition mayors “lame ducks”, pointing that they lacked majority in local councils.

While Turkey awaits the results of the recounting in Istanbul and some speculate that the AKP may apply to the Supreme Electoral Board for the cancellation of votes in the province, the government has also other means to make things difficult for the opposition’s mayors, the experts say.

In order to keep the economic power in Istanbul and Ankara, the Turkish government can hand over the authority to approve construction permits to the Ministry of Environment and Urbanisation, said Karatepe, adding that the government previously transferred powers over urban transformation projects to the ministry.

“And they may make it more difficult for the metropolitan municipalities taken over by the opposition to access the resources of the Treasury. I am not saying they will, but they have that opportunity,” Karatepe said.

According to Ersin Kalaycıoğlu, a political scientist at the Sabancı University, the AKP does not want to hand over the financial resources of the Istanbul municipality. “The government does not want the municipalities it controls to be held accountable,” he said.

The AKP may seek ways to limit the budgets of Istanbul and Ankara municipalities in case the opposition mayors are declared as winners after official results are announced, but that does not mean that the prospective mayors of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) will lack alternatives, Kalaycıoğlu said. “The government for years have been preventing access of the CHP’s Izmir and Eskişehir municipalities to many opportunities. But they are managed quite well despite that. That means, if the right model is used, there are ways of overcoming budget cuts,” he said.

Celal Uzunkaya, the head of Turkey’s Security General Directorate, has said 33,372 members of the police force of various ranks have been dismissed since a 2016 failed coup, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.

Police departments have approximately 300,000 members nationwide, Uzunkaya said, adding that in the last three-and-a-half years they have recruited more than 80,000 policemen.

The dismissed police officers were believed to be affiliated with the faith-based Gülen movement, which the government holds responsible for the abortive putsch, although the movement denies any involvement.

During a two-year-long state of emergency that ended last July, Turkey dismissed by government decree some 140,000 public servants over Gülen links.