Keyword: Freedoms
I Weep For Turkey
It has been the same topic of discourse everywhere. And it won’t stop anytime soon because of the atrocities that have followed, all in the name of sanitising the country and arresting masterminds of the phantom coup. The news coming out of Turkey has been really disturbing to many, and equally baffling to the world.
New Level of Witch Hunt: Relatives are Targeted in Turkey
On July 26, Turkish police stormed the house of Muhammet Cakir, a lawyer wanted for arrest on coup charges. Failing to find the lawyer at home, they detained his 86-year-old mother to force her son to surrender. She has been kept as hostage since.
PM Sipilä and FM Soini of Finland: Turkey needs to return to a path that respects human rights
Prime Minister Juha Sipilä and Foreign Minister Timo Soini [of Finland] have responded to a letter from the Finnish Union of Journalists. The Union’s missive asked the ministers to urge Turkey to avoid extreme measures in the aftermath of July’s failed coup.
My Father, Academic, Arrested In Turkey Purge
13 days have passed since my father was taken from us by the police and we still did not have a chance to speak with him. His lawyers predict that it may take up to at least six months until he goes to the court. The most painful moment was when I saw in the news that 14 militants linked to ISIS, from whom the police captured AK-47s, were released on the same day. Turkey now views my father and his colleagues more dangerous than ISIS militants.
German Politician: Turkey like Nazi Germany after Reichstag
FDP leader Christian Lindner said he saw parallels between Erdogan’s behavior and the aftermath of the Reichstag fire in 1933 portrayed by the Nazis as a Communist plot against the government and used by Adolf Hitler to justify massively curtailing civil liberties. “We are experiencing a coup d’etat from above like in 1933 after the Reichstag fire. He is building an authoritarian regime tailored solely to himself,” Lindner said.
Religious freedom threatened by Turkey’s response to coup
From his self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania, Gulen has disavowed any association with the coup attempt. “My philosophy — inclusive and pluralist Islam, dedicated to service to human beings from every faith — is antithetical to armed rebellion,” Gulen wrote for The New York Times.
How It Feels to Be a Dissident in Turkey After the Failed Military Coup
LOUISE CALLAGHAN To plan a speedy political exile from Turkey today, you need two things: a world map and the Wikipedia page on “visa entry requirements for Turkish citizens.” If you get out a highlighter and start cross-referencing the two, you’ll quickly see the bottom half of the map is more accessible than the top. […]
Turkey: Detained higher education professionals at risk of torture
Scholars at Risk (SAR) is gravely concerned about sweeping actions against Turkey’s higher education sector, including most recently prolonged incommunicado detention and related risks of torture and ill-treatment of hundreds of higher education professionals, in violation of Turkey’s obligations under domestic and international law.
Free speech groups condemn Turkey’s closure of 29 publishers after failed coup
Jo Glanville, director of English PEN, said: “The coup posed a serious threat to the Turkish state, but the closing down of publishers, alongside the mass sackings, detentions, arrests and allegations of torture, will have a grave impact on democracy. The crackdown on freedom of expression was already a continuing concern. The coup now appears to be an opportunity for Erdoğan to purge Turkey of his opponents.
A Personal Story from Turkey: I am a “Man of Law” Not a Terrorist!
I am a lawyer, I am man of law but according to President Erdogan I am a “terrorist” who attempted for a coup! I am writing this letter from a city in Eastern Europe as I had to run away from persecution. Just after my departure on 22 July, Turkish police arrived at my house but could not find me. Instead, with the intention to bring me out they have decided to detain my mother who is 86 years old and can barely walk.
Turkey detainees tortured, raped after failed coup, rights group says
Jason Hanna and Tim Hume Captured military officers raped by police, hundreds of soldiers beaten, some detainees denied food and water and access to lawyers for days. These are the grim conditions that many of the thousands who were arrested in Turkey face in the aftermath of a recent failed coup, witnesses tell Amnesty International. […]
UN and OSCE experts deplore crackdown on journalists and media outlets in Turkey
UN / OSCE: The Government’s purging of personnel and institutions of what it perceives as being dissenting and critical voices, solely on the basis of allegations of membership in the Gülen movement, clearly violates standards of international human rights law.
