Diyarbakir mayors arrested

[Benny]

Hi,

this one slipped me by this week, I stumbled upon it today:

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-turke ... 2P2SI?il=0

Arrested on charges that they are helping militants.

All the best,
Benny

[Anthea]

Hi,

this one slipped me by this week, I stumbled upon it today:

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-turke ... 2P2SI?il=0

Arrested on charges that they are helping militants.

All the best,
Benny

Thank you Benny

I do not think that the Turkish government will stop untel it has closed down the HDP completely

HDP Chairman Selahattin Demirtaş is too blame for most of the problems with his open support of the PKK

Many people who voted for the HDP did so believing they were an independent party - in fact some of the MPs themselves believed they were standing for an independent Kurdish party and do not approve of Selahattin Demirtaş bringing the HDP into disrepute by supporting the PKK

There are a great deal of conflict within the party and the HDP have made a great many mistakes - among them taking over the Nawroz celebrations and using it as a political rally in support of the PKK

The HDP would be far better off without Selahattin Demirtaş and the PKK would be far better off without Ocalan (who has been openly supporting the Turkish government in recent years

The PKK should be run by Murat Karayılan

[Anthea]

Turkey sacks 10,000 more civil servants and shuts down 15 more media outlets in latest crackdown following military coup

Turkey has sacked a further 10,000 civil servants following failed coup
The government has also forced 15 more media organisations to shut down
They are all accused of having links to the US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen
Ankara has blamed Gulen for orchestrating the failed uprising in July

Turkey has sacked another 10,000 of its civil servants and shut down 15 more media outlets they claim supported a failed military coup in the country earlier this year.

The government has dismissed the officials and closed down the organisations saying they have suspected links to terrorist organisations and US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who Ankara has blamed for the failed uprising.

More than 100,000 people had already been sacked or suspended and 37,000 arrested since the failed coup, in an unprecedented crackdown the government says is necessary to root out all supporters of Gulen from the state apparatus.

Thousands more academics, teachers, health workers, prison guards and forensics experts were among the latest to be removed from their posts through two new executive decrees published on the Official Gazette late on Saturday.

Opposition parties described the move as a coup in itself and the continued crackdown has also raised concerns over the functioning of state.

Sezgin Tanrikulu, an MP from the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), said in a Periscope broadcast posted on Twitter: 'What the government and Erdogan are doing right now is a direct coup against the rule of law and democracy.'

The decrees have ordered the closure of 15 more newspapers, wires and magazines, which report from the largely Kurdish southeast, bringing the total number of media organisations closed since the emergency rule in July to nearly 160.

In another move set to anger President Tayyip Erdogan's opponents, the ability of universities to elect their own rectors was also abolished.

Erdogan will from now on directly appoint the rectors from the candidates nominated by the High Educational Board (YOK).

The extent of the crackdown has worried rights groups and many of Turkey's Western allies, who fear Erdogan is using the emergency rule to eradicate dissent.

The government says the actions are justified following the coup attempt on July 15, when more than 240 people died.

Lale Karabiyik, another CHP lawmaker, said the move was a clear misuse of the emergency rule decrees and described it as a coup d'etat on the high education system.

Pro-Kurdish opposition said the decrees were used as tools to establish a 'one-man regime'.

The government extended the state of emergency imposed after the coup attempt for three months until mid-January.

Erdogan said the authorities needed more time to wipe out the threat posed by Gulen's network as well as Kurdish militants who have waged a 32-year insurgency.

Ankara wants the United States to detain and extradite Gulen so that he can be prosecuted in Turkey on a charge that he masterminded the attempt to overthrow the government.

Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania since 1999, denies any involvement.

Speaking to reporters at a reception marking the Republic Day on Saturday, Erdogan said the nation wanted the reinstatement of the death penalty, a debate which has emerged following the coup attempt, and added that delaying it would not be right. (bye bye Ocalan)

"I believe this issue will come to the parliament," he said, and repeated that he would approve it, a move that would sink Turkey's hopes of European Union membership.

Erdogan shrugged off such concerns, saying that much of the world had capital punishment.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... kdown.html

[Benny]

Reinstatement of the death penalty, that doesn't sound good at all.