Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen has extended condolences for victims of the coal mine blast in western Turkish town of Soma, wishing speedy recovery for injured workers.
“They were working in the most dire conditions to make the ends meet for their families,” Gülen said about the victims, adding that no word would be a consolation and no word would express the pain of separation. “We can do nothing except pray for them and share their pains with wept eyes,” Gülen stressed.
He wished that trapped mine workers will be saved soon.
Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yıldız said at least 151 workers died in the coal mine blast while hundreds are still trapped inside.
Turkish deputy PM says Fethullah Gülen is supra-political, conscience of 75 million people in Turkey
In an interview with TRT Türk TV channel on Wednesday, Arınç described Gülen as “supra-politics,” and said he is the “conscience of 75 million people” in Turkey. He praised Gülen for only talking truth and recommending right things, even to the opposition. Bülent Arınç met with Gülen last week in his residence in Pennsylvania in a visit he described as “personal.”
5,166 Turkish citizens sought asylum in Germany during January-November
According to data from the German Federal Ministry of the Interior, there has been a rapid rise in the number of Turkish people seeking asylum in Germany since a failed coup attempt on July 15. Germany received asylum applications from a total of 5,166 Turkish citizens during the January-November period of 2016, according to a story in Deutsche Welle on Sunday.
Religious communities under threat in Turkey
These operations might have targeted the government in some respects, but so far no concrete evidence has been produced about deliberate, systematic and willful inclusion of the Hizmet movement in this plot. It is true that the Hizmet movement’s media group has been lending support to the graft and bribery investigation.
AK Party gov’t treats critical letters, columns as ‘treachery’
In an attempt to defame the Hizmet movement inspired by Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, the Turkish government and its media outlets have presented letters sent by civil society representatives affiliated with the faith-based movement to foreign officials providing them with information about the situation in Turkey as “treachery.”
Turkey’s ‘black box’ must be opened
The recent debate on tutoring centers and private prep schools and the shocking revelations on the dirty warfare used in the 1990s against the Kurdish population are certainly parts of this pressure-cooker-like mood. It is obvious that “Erdoğan’s Way” of running the country is based on keeping tension just under control, so that it will serve his own ambitions to cement personal power.
AKP: What is next?
Neither Erdoğan nor his bureaucrats could convince the public that their plan was educational, and not an attempt to punish the Hizmet movement. Gül, Arınç and several of Erdoğan’s ministers couldn’t stop Erdoğan, who started a war against the Hizmet movement and even directly attacked Fethullah Gülen by taking remarks Gülen made about the headscarf ban 15 years ago completely out of context.
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