Tahşiye leader Doğan extends love to Osama bin Ladin

Leader of Tahşiye group Mehmet Doğan, who was shown as an explanation for latest raids on media outlets, a CNN Türk reporter reported that he loves Osama bin Laden.

Turkish police carried out a large-scale operation against the media outlets detaining dozens of journalists, scriptwriters and police officials following the leader of Tahşiye group filed a complaint that the related media plotted against him during 2010 police operations.

Attending to ‘Baştan Sona’ program at CNN Türk hosted by Akif Beki, who was former spokesman of Erdoğan, Tahşiye leader Doğan denied his group's links to al-Qaeda.

Turkey orders extradition of president’s rival #FethullahGulen over terrorism claims

Fethullah Gulen is head of the ‘moderate Islamic movement’ Hizmet

A Turkish court has issued an arrest warrant for dissident and self-imposed exile Fethullah Gülen as he is accused of running an “armed terrorist group” to allegedly overthrow the government.

Mr Gulen, who was once an ally of current president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and has now lived in the US state of Pennsylvania since 1999, strongly denies the claims that his group Hizmet is involved with terrorist-related activity.

While the US and Turkey have an extradition agreement, it is said to be unlikely for the former to act upon it while the request is said to put more pressure on strained relations between Washington DC and Ankara.

Read full story at http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/turkey-orders-extradition-of-presidents-rival-fethullah-gulen-over-terrorism-claims-9937579.html

Erdoğan’s fear by Ihsan Yilmaz

by Ihsan Yilmaz - I am extremely bored of the fact that we have to keep writing about Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Nevertheless, since he has unfortunately created a party state without effective checks and balances, in this one-man regime, he is the single-most influential decision maker. Thus, whatever he does negatively influences and harms the whole nation. We are not in a position to ignore this fact or talk about some other issues just because we are bored and fed up with Erdoğan.

In the past, we, including myself, were not responsive enough to prevent Turkey from gradually descending into a one-man regime and even unintentionally helped him create such a system since we did not criticize him timely, properly, harshly and frequently enough. Maybe this is a spiritual punishment that we have to suffer. I made an apology at the beginning of the year for all these mistakes of mine, including my failure to object to the arrests of journalists.

Read full article at http://www.todayszaman.com/columnist/ihsan-yilmaz/erdogans-fear_367486.html

#Tahşiye leader Doğan says he ’loves Osama bin Ladin’

 

Leader of Turkey's Tahşiye group Mehmet Doğan, who is at the heart of the latest crackdown on media, has told CNNTurk that he "loves Osama bin Laden."

Turkish authorities carried out a large-scale operation in the weekend, detaining dozens of journalists, scripwriters and police officials after Doğan filed a complaint that the group plotted against him. A Turkish court issued an arrest warrant for Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen on Friday on charges of publicly criticizing the leader of the al-Qaeda group.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan defended Doğan and his group, accusing detained journalists and Gülen for orchestrating a plot against him. Doğan was jailed for 17 months and he was later released pending trial.

Speaking to Akif Beki, former spokesman of Erdoğan, Doğan denied any links to al-Qaeda, but said he loves bin Laden because he is a Muslim. When asked if he views bin Laden as a terrorist or not, Doğan said he doesn't know if "his jihad is right or wrong" because he is living a reclusive life.

In another video extensively broadcast on TVs, Doğan is heard praising bin Laden and al-Qaeda. In one case, Yiğit Bulut, who is now Erdoğan's chief aide, says "we need to cleanse Islam from this al-Qaide affiliates."

Source:  http://www.todayszaman.com/national_tahsiye-leader-dogan-says-he-loves-osama-bin-ladin_367516.html

WHAT IS HAPPENING IN TURKEY: ASCERTAINMENT OF DAMAGE AFTER POLL

By Ugur Tezcan

After months of political turmoil and corruption scandals, Turkey's most controversial local elections are finally over. These local elections have been the toughest, the most polarizing and dividing in the country's political history. PM Erdogan's ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) declared a 46-percent win, but ensuing results indicated that AKP won 43-percent of the vote. Erdogan didn't wait to make his balcony speech until results have been verified by the Supreme Electoral Council of Turkey (aka YSK) and stated that the opponents "will pay!"

Not so surprisingly, Erdogan's ruling party wasn't the only one to call election results a victory. Three other opposition parties; Republican People's Party (CHP), Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) also declared the local elections a success based on their gains and overall performance. These four parties won about 95-percent of the vote. Other political parties lost voters to major players of the game due mainly to the nature of this highly polarized election.

The 2014 local elections have been peculiar in many regards. So unique that I believe an analysis and ascertainment of damage is indispensable for various reasons. Such an analysis will shed light on the fate of upcoming elections in Turkey.

Erdogan's ‘witch hunt' and abuse of state power

by Aydogan Vatandas - It was only about a week ago that Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated that his government will carry out a witch hunt on his own people: “If reassigning individuals who betray this country is called a witch hunt, then yes, we will carry out a witch hunt.”

AK Party's Islamism

By Mumtazer Turkone

It is wrong to link the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) to al-Qaeda. Rather, the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) of Egypt and Jamaat-e-Islami of Pakistan served as a role model for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) and the National View (Milli Görüş) movement from which it had sprung. Yet the AK Party has always distanced itself from radical Islamist movements that resort to violence.

Are ambassadors propaganda officials for the ruling party?

After Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan ordered Turkish ambassadors to explain to foreign diplomats the recent graft and bribery scandal from a conspiracy-oriented and partisan perspective, the Turkish ambassador to Washington will certainly have the hardest time complying with this instruction.