Shots Fired at U.S. Embassy in Turkey Amid Deepening Row
Ties between Ankara and Washington have been strained over the case of an imprisoned American pastor, leading the U.S. to impose sanctions, and increased tariffs that sent the Turkish lira tumbling last week.
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180831_04/
An Erdogan statue is removed in Wiesbaden. Majority of its residents have Turkish roots.
It's been a focal point for anti-Erdogan critics.
The article and the embedded video are contradicting each other - video says people protested the removal of the statue while the article said they protested its removal.
Which one is it then?
Edited by DrunkenNordmann on Aug 31st 2018 at 9:14:15 PM
We learn from history that we do not learn from historyBoth?
The Statue was there as part of an Art Festival and when both supporters and opponents (both German and German-Turkish) started getting into arguments over it (with Demonstrations being started to be organized), Wiesbadens Mayor Nope'd and had it removed before it got nasty.
"You can reply to this Message!"Turkey will conduct 'operations' against Erdogan's enemies in U.S.
The threat comes amid diplomatic tensions over Americans jailed in Turkey and the arrest or abduction of dozens of Turkish citizens in almost 20 countries.
Erdogan spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said Turkey’s National Intelligence Organization would launch overseas “operations” against supporters of Fethullah Gulen, an elderly cleric who lives in exile in Pennsylvania.
“They will feel Turkey breathing down their neck,” Kalin told reporters in Ankara.
Erdogan accuses Gulen of orchestrating the July 2016 coup attempt and has referred to his global movement as FETO, which stands for “Fethullah Terror Group.” Gulen denies having any role in the putsch.
Turkey has repeatedly pressed the White House to extradite Gulen, while officials are working inside other countries to detain and remove his followers.
“Relevant units and institutions will continue their operations in countries where FETO operates, whether in the U.S. or another country,” Kalin said. “The Turkish Republic will not let them rest.”
Turkish opposition candidate declared winner of disputed Istanbul vote
Initial results from the March 31 local elections gave a narrow victory to the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) in Turkey's commercial hub, ending 25 years of control by the AK Party (AKP) and its Islamist predecessors.
New CHP mayor Ekrem Imamoglu was handed a paper, mounted in a gold frame, which formally granted his mandate as city mayor in a ceremony at an Istanbul court which was surrounded by a throng of supporters.
The loss is especially hard for Erdogan, who launched his political career in Istanbul as mayor in the 1990s. The Turkish lira, which has dipped since the election, firmed on Wednesday.
On Tuesday, after 16 days of appeals and recounts, the AKP asked the High Election Board (YSK) to annul and re-run the election in Istanbul over what it said were irregularities. Its nationalist MHP allies made a similar request on Wednesday.
The AKP had also urged officials to block Imamoglu from taking office until a ruling on their appeal was made.
The repeated challenges by the AKP and MHP have fuelled frustration among opposition supporters which spilled over into football stadiums at the weekend when fans chanted at top Istanbul derby matches for the mayoral mandate to be given to their candidate.
"There are way too many irregularities," AKP Deputy Chairman Ali Ihsan Yavuz said, presenting the party's justification for its demand for a new vote. "We are saying that organised fraud, unlawfulness and crimes were committed."
CHP Deputy Chairman Muharrem Erkek responded that there were "no concrete documents, information or evidence in the AKP appeal for an annulment."
"There is no legitimate reason at all. You are using your right (to appeal) to damage the will of Istanbul," he said.
While the AKP appears to have lost control of the mayorship in Istanbul, initial results showed the party had won most seats in its municipal councils. The AKP's re-run appeal applies only to the mayoral elections, not those for municipal councils.
Wolfango Piccoli, co-president of Teneo political risk advisers, said it was puzzling to call only for a re-run of the mayoral elections, and added that some of the areas where the AKP claimed fraud took place were under its responsibility.
Uncertainty over the election results has also put pressure on financial markets, pushing the lira down nearly 5 percent.
"From the market perspective, an extended period of uncertainty around elections is a bad idea - it would suggest more election-related policy easing which is bad for the rebalancing story," Tim Ash, senior emerging markets strategist at Blue Bay Asset Management, told Reuters.
Erdogan had vowed that Turkey would enter a four and half year period with no elections after March 31, during which the ailing economy would be the focus. If the AKP appeal is approved, Istanbul, which makes up more than a third of Turkey's economy, will head to polls again on June 2.
(REUTERS)
Istanbul's Mayor election got annulled
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's AKP party had filed a motion with the Supreme Electoral Council (YSK) on April 16 to nullify the election, alleging "irregularities." The objection also claimed that a margin of only 15,000 votes in a city as large as Istanbul was too close to be fair.
Turkish newspaper Haberturk said that the reason given for the new vote was that some ballot box workers were not official civil servants and that some results documents were unsigned.
The YSK had previously confirmed CHP candidate Ekrem Imamoglu the winner of the mayoral race in Erdogan's hometown, as the AKP launched its "extraordinary objection" to the results.

It's a mistake they make again and again with those kind of leaders. I guess we are a little bit naive, maybe because we did experience leaders who actually cared about something else than just securing their own power.