Tag Archives: coup attempt

Turkish court rules that U.S. pastor move from jail to house arrest

FILE PHOTO: A prison vehicle, believed to be carrying jailed U.S. pastor Andrew Brunson, leaves from the Aliaga Prison and Courthouse complex in Izmir, Turkey July 18, 2018. REUTERS/Kemal Aslan

By Ezgi Erkoyun and Daren Butler

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – A Turkish court ruled on Wednesday that an American pastor be transferred from jail to house arrest, his lawyer said, after nearly two years in detention on terrorism charges in a case which has strained ties between Ankara and Washington.

Andrew Brunson, a Christian pastor from North Carolina who has worked in Turkey for more than 20 years, was detained in October 2016 and indicted on charges of helping the group which Ankara says was behind a failed military coup earlier that year.

Brunson’s lawyer Ismail Cem Halavurt confirmed Turkish media reports that the court had ruled for him to be moved to house arrest. He will have to wear an electronic ankle bracelet and is banned from leaving the country, Halavurt said.

A week ago the same court rejected a call by Brunson’s defense for his release. State-owned Anadolu news agency said the court decided, after re-evaluating the case, that he could leave prison on health grounds and because he would be under effective judicial control.

It said Brunson’s defense had been completed and evidence for the case was almost all collected.

Brunson’s detention deepened a rift between NATO allies Washington and Ankara – also at odds over the Syrian war and Turkey’s plan to buy missile defenses from Russia – and financial markets took his transfer order as a positive sign.

The Turkish lira strengthened to 4.8325 against the dollar from 4.8599 before the report. Shares in Halkbank, whose former deputy general manager was convicted in January of evading U.S. sanctions on Iran, jumped 12 percent.

Brunson was indicted on charges of helping supporters of Fethullah Gulen, the U.S.-based cleric who Turkish authorities say masterminded the coup attempt against President Tayyip Erdogan in which 250 people were killed. He was also charged with supporting outlawed PKK Kurdish militants.

The pastor, who denies the charges, faces up to 35 years in jail if found guilty.

Erdogan has previously linked his fate to that of Gulen, whose extradition from the United States has been a long-held demand of Turkish authorities. Gulen denies any involvement in the coup.

President Donald Trump said in a tweet last week that Brunson was being held hostage and that Erdogan should “do something to free this wonderful Christian husband & father”.

The U.S. Senate passed a bill last month including a measure that prohibits Turkey from buying F-35 Joint Strike Fighter jets because of Brunson’s imprisonment and Turkey’s purchase of Russia’s S-400 air defense system.

(Reporting by Daren Butler and Tuvan Gumrukcu; Writing by Dominic Evans; editing by David Stamp)

Turkey to end extraditions to U.S. unless cleric is turned over, Erdogan says

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a meeting at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey,

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey will not extradite any suspects to the United States if Washington does not hand over the cleric Ankara blames for orchestrating a failed 2016 military coup, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday.

Ankara accuses U.S.-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen of masterminding the putsch and has repeatedly asked Washington for his extradition. U.S. officials have said courts require sufficient evidence to extradite the elderly cleric who has denied any involvement in the coup.

“We have given the United States 12 terrorists so far, but they have not given us back the one we want. They made up excuses from thin air,” Erdogan told local administrators at a conference in his presidential palace in Ankara.

“If you’re not giving him (Gulen) to us, then excuse us, but from now on whenever you ask us for another terrorist, as long as I am in office, you will not get them,” he said.

Turkey is the biggest Muslim country in NATO and an important U.S. ally in the Middle East.

But Ankara and Washington have been at loggerheads over a wide range of issues in recent months, including a U.S. alliance with Kurdish fighters in Syria and the conviction of a Turkish bank executive in a U.S. sanctions-busting case that included testimony of corruption by senior Turkish officials.

On Wednesday, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said ties were harmed by Washington’s failure to extradite Gulen and U.S. support for Syria’s Kurdish YPG militia and its PYD political arm. He said relations could deteriorate further.

“The United States does not listen to us, but it listens to the PYD/YPG. Can there be such a strategic partnership?… Turkey is not a country that will be tripped up by the United States’ inconsistent policies in the region,” Erdogan said.

Last week, a U.S. jury convicted an executive of Turkey’s majority state-owned Halkbank of evading U.S. sanctions on Iran, in a case which Erdogan has condemned as a “political coup attempt” and a joint effort by the CIA, FBI and Gulen’s network to undermine Turkey.

The two countries also suspended issuing visas for months last year over a dispute following the detention of two locally employed U.S. consulate workers in Turkey on suspicion of links to the failed 2016 coup.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Dominic Evans and Peter Graff)

Zarrab trial in U.S. is a ‘clear plot against Turkey’, government says

Turkish gold trader Reza Zarrab (2nd R) sits with lawyers Erich Ferrari (L), Marc Agnifilo, and Benjamin Brafman (R) as he appears in Manhattan federal court in New York, U.S., April 24, 2017.

ANKARA (Reuters) – A U.S. court case against a wealthy Turkish gold trader is a “clear plot against Turkey” that lacks any legal basis, Ankara’s government spokesman said on Monday, ratcheting up rhetoric ahead of a trial that has strained diplomatic relations.

Bekir Bozdag also told a news conference that the U.S. case was aimed at harming economic relations between Turkey, Iran and Russia. He said U.S. authorities were putting pressure on defendants, including the gold trader Reza Zarrab, to make accusations against Turkey.

“The Zarrab case is a clear plot against Turkey, a political case and lacking any legal basis,” Bozdag told a news conference following a cabinet meeting.

“The Zarrab case aims to damage Turkey’s ties with Iran, Russia and other countries. Those who are carrying out the Zarrab case through defendants are very clearly using pressure… They are forcing them to (make) accusations that are against Turkey.”

Zarrab, together with alleged co-conspirators, has been charged with handling hundreds of millions of dollars for Iran’s government and Iranian entities from 2010 to 2015, in a scheme to avoid U.S. sanctions on Iran. He has pleaded not guilty and is due to go on trial in New York on Nov. 27.

Ankara says the case is based on fabricated documents. Turkish authorities opened an investigation into the U.S. prosecutors who brought charges against Zarrab, state media said on Saturday, citing the allegations that it was based on fabricated documents.

Under a previous Turkish investigation that became public in 2013, Turkish prosecutors accused Zarrab and high-ranking Turkish officials of involvement in facilitating Iranian money transfers via gold smuggling, leaked documents at the time showed.

President Tayyip Erdogan, then prime minister, cast that investigation as a coup attempt orchestrated by his political enemies. Several Turkish prosecutors were removed from the case, police investigators were reassigned, and the investigation was later dropped.

Erdogan, who has not been accused of any wrongdoing, has said U.S. prosecutors have shown “ulterior motives” by including references to him and his wife in court papers relating to the trial in New York.

 

(Reporting by Orhan Coskun, Ezgi Erkoyun and Tuvan Gumrukcu; Writing by David Dolan; Editing by Dominic Evans)