The Justice Ministry of Bosnia and Herzegovina has put an end to Turkey’s persistent efforts to have a journalist living exile extradited to Turkey on trumped-up terrorism charges, setting a strong precedent for other Turkish citizens resident in Bosnia who are being harassed and threatened with prosecution in Turkey.
No society can truly move forward if women, who make half of its population, are limited in their freedoms, rights, and opportunities. The way women are treated and the rights given to them are signs of where that society stands in terms of universal human values.
The situation in Turkey has been very bad since a failed coup attempt in 2016. Erdogan unleashed a massive purge, firing more than 100,000 public-sector workers and imprisoning more than 50,000 people. These people are not criminals. They include judges, academics and journalists. Erdogan thinks free speech is dangerous, and he accuses critics of being terrorists.
Most customers do not recognize the fit, well-dressed man walking around Tuts Bakery and Cafe, picking up used cups and dirty dishes. Why would they? And what would he be doing here? Hakan Sukur, 46, is one of Turkey’s most famous athletes, its most celebrated soccer player, a World Cup hero and a veteran of several of Europe’s top leagues. So how did Sukur end up here?
In Turkey under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the tweet has been turned into a crime, and a troubled democracy is being turned into a dictatorship. Gradually but inexorably, a nation that once aspired to be an exemplar of enlightened moderation is being transformed by Mr. Erdogan into a dreary totalitarian prison.
The trial of Turkish journalist Hidayet Karaca (55) has already taken its place in judicial history because not only has he been persecuted by the Turkish government but also both his lawyers and the judges who ruled to release him from jail have been imprisoned.
Two years of the seizure of his newspaper and his sacking, the former bureau chief of Zaman newspaper in Brussels, Selçuk Gültasli, visited the EFJ-IFJ headquarter to deliver a special briefing on “the desperate situation of Zaman journalists and media workers in jail” in Turkey.
Gülen say, “The principles and form of government that form the basis of democracy are compatible with Islamic values. Consultation, justice, freedom of religion, protection of the rights of individuals and minorities, the people’s say in the election of those who would govern them…[are] principles espoused by both Islam and democracy.”