4-year-old visits dad in jail on Children’s Day wearing T-shirt with newborn brother’s picture
Date posted: April 24, 2017
We can all pack up and go home because a 4-year-old has just rendered Turkey’s Children’s Day meaningless.
Minutes before paying a visit to her jailed father early on Sunday morning, H.A. was photographed in front of Sakarya L Type Prison wearing a T-shirt bearing a photo of her newborn baby brother.
She couldn’t bring the infant himself to visit due to regulations; therefore, his photo was printed on her T-shirt to show the imprisoned father his newborn son.
The father was reportedly arrested as part of an investigation into the Gülen movement, which is accused of masterminding a coup attempt on July 15, 2016.
The movement denies any involvement.
However, the government has so far investigated around 90,000 people and jailed more than 47,000 over links to the group. Prisoners in such investigations include teachers, doctors, lawyers, pharmacists, students, plumbers, football players, actors and even a comedian.
Questions to challenge the primary and unjustified premise: What judicial (or other) process determined that these corruption investigations were a coup attempt against the government? What proof or evidence do you have to support this most serious claim? What disciplinary process did you undertake to determine that the people that were purged were members and culprits of this ‘coup’? In the absence of evidence and disciplinary process how did you determine these people’s association with Hizmet? When is government corruption not a judicial coup? How can you have the right to unilaterally determine the intent and purpose of these ongoing judicial investigations when your government is implicated in them? If your government can purge over 7,000 police officers (and thereby affect and prevent these investigations) without evidence, due process or disciplinary procedure, do you not set a precedent for every future potentially corrupt government to follow?
False reports on Bank Asya breach laws
Earlier reports in the Turkish media had claimed that the government had mulled over a comprehensive investigation into Bank Asya following an ongoing corruption and bribery case. The papers cited the Hizmet movement — with which Bank Asya is affiliated — as the hand behind the police operations into persons close to the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party). The same reports implied a retaliatory attack on Bank Asya over alleged abuses within the bank.
A Case Study In How Lobbyists For Turkish Government Manipulate The American Media on Gulen Issue
Turkish news outlets lit up this weekend after a former Republican lawmaker published an op-ed at The Hill calling on the U.S. government to extradite Fethullah Gulen, an exiled Muslim cleric whose return to Turkey is an obsession for the NATO nation’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
A Year Ago Today: Teacher Gökhan Açıkkollu died of torture on his 13th day in police custody
Gökhan Açıkkollu, a history teacher suffering from diabetes, died of torture in police custody as part of a post-coup investigation into Turkey’s Gülen group. According to his father, Ayhan Açıkkollu, Gökhan was a diabetics patient while human rights defenders hinted at torture and maltreatment.
Coup in Turkey, Turkish Schools in Nigeria, and Implications for Nigeria’s National Security
President Erdogan has also asked the Government of Nigeria to close down all Turkish schools in Nigeria allegedly because Fetullah Gulen was the main architect of the failed coup in Turkey. Is this request in Nigeria’s national interest? In which way is the Turkish failed coup likely to impact on Nigeria’s national security? How important is Nigeria-Turkish relations in the country’s overall global relations?
Erdoğan’s harsh, xenophobic rhetoric damages fight against Islamophobia
The increasingly punitive and xenophobic discourse adopted by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in recent years has done a huge disservice to the fight against Islamophobia, dealing a blow to the decades-long efforts of organizations such as the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the Hizmet movement in international forums.
Latest News
Turkish inmate jailed over alleged Gülen links dies of heart attack in prison
Message of Condemnation and Condolences for Mass Shooting at Bondi Beach, Sydney
Media executive Hidayet Karaca marks 11th year in prison over alleged links to Gülen movement
ECtHR faults Turkey for convictions of 2,420 applicants over Gülen links in follow-up to 2023 judgment
New Book Exposes Erdoğan’s “Civil Death Project” Targeting the Hizmet Movement
European Human Rights Treaty Faces Legal And Political Tests
ECtHR rejects Turkey’s appeal, clearing path for retrials in Gülen-linked cases
Erdoğan’s Civil Death Project’ : The ‘politicide’ spanning more than a decade
Fethullah Gülen’s Vision and the Purpose of Hizmet
In Case You Missed It
State Department: US concerned by rhetoric from Turkey on Russian envoy killing
Crackdown on journalists leaves void in post-coup Turkey
New York Times : Hundreds of Police Officers Reassigned in Turkey
Turks Fleeing Persecution Find Haven in South Africa
Turkish Cultural Center Vermont gives awards at Friendship Dinner
Minister Yazici Visits Kazakh-Turkish High School
66,000 students relocated after Turkish government shut down 15 universities over coup charges