Tag Archives: Gulen

U.S. pastor denies allegations of coup links as Turkey trial begins

FILE PHOTO: Andrew Brunson, a Christian pastor from North Carolina, U.S. who has been in jail in Turkey since December 2016, is seen in this undated picture taken in Izmir, Turkey. Depo Photos via REUTERS

By Ezgi Erkoyun

ALIAGA, Turkey (Reuters) – A U.S. pastor denied allegations of links to a group accused of orchestrating a failed military coup in Turkey as he went on trial on Monday in a case that has compounded strains in U.S.-Turkish relations.

Andrew Brunson, a Christian pastor from North Carolina who has lived in Turkey for more than two decades, was indicted on charges of helping the group that Ankara holds responsible for the failed 2016 coup against President Tayyip Erdogan. He faces up to 35 years in prison.

“I’ve never done something against Turkey. I love Turkey. I’ve been praying for Turkey for 25 years. I want truth to come out,” Brunson told the court in the western Turkish town of Aliaga, north of the Aegean city of Izmir.

Brunson has been the pastor of Izmir Resurrection Church, serving a small Protestant congregation in Turkey’s third largest city.

Turkish gendarmes patrol outside of Aliaga Prison and Courthouse complex in Izmir, Turkey April 16, 2018. REUTERS/Sadi Osman Temizel

Turkish gendarmes patrol outside of Aliaga Prison and Courthouse complex in Izmir, Turkey April 16, 2018. REUTERS/Sadi Osman Temizel

“I do not accept the charges mentioned in the indictment. I was never involved in any illegal activities,” said Brunson, wearing a white shirt and black suit and making his defence in Turkish. His wife was in the courtroom, as were North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis and the U.S. envoy for religious freedom, Sam Brownback.

Brunson’s trial is one of several legal cases roiling U.S.-Turkish relations. The two countries are also at odds over U.S. support for a Kurdish militia in northern Syria that Turkey considers a terrorist organisation.

Washington has called for Brunson’s release while Erdogan suggested last year his fate could be linked to that of U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, whose extradition Ankara has repeatedly sought to face charges over the coup attempt.

Gulen denies any association with the coup bid. Tens of thousands of Turks have been arrested or lost their jobs over alleged connections with the coup bid.

“The United States cares deeply about our relationship with Turkey,” Brownback told reporters during a recess at the trial “That relationship is going to have difficulty moving forward as long as Andrew Brunson is incarcerated.”

RELIGIOUS BELIEFS

Brunson’s lawyer said the pastor, detained 18 months ago, was in custody because of his religious beliefs. Turkey is a majority Muslim country though constitutionally secular.

“There is evidence that shows Brunson was arrested due to his faith,” Ismail Cem Halavurt told Reuters on the eve of the trial, saying Brunson’s religious role had been “classified as aiding terror organisations”.

The Izmir prosecutor’s office said that sufficient evidence had been obtained to charge Brunson with aiding armed terrorist organisations and obtaining confidential government information for political and military espionage.

A copy of Brunson’s indictment seen by Reuters accuses him of working both with Gulen’s network and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group which has waged an insurgency in mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey and is designated a terrorist group by the United States and European Union.

Halavurt said on Sunday he believed Brunson would ultimately be acquitted and there was no reason for his continued detention during trial. “Our prior expectation from the hearing is ending the arrest,” he said. “We want Brunson to be freed immediately.”

(Additional reporting by Ece Toksabay in Ankara; Writing by Daren Butler; Editing by David Dolan/Mark Heinrich)

Syrian frontline town divides NATO allies Turkey and U.S.

American army vehicles drive north of Manbij city, in Aleppo Governorate, Syria March 9, 2017.

By Dominic Evans

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – A dispute between Turkey and the United States over control of a north Syrian town has put the NATO allies on opposing sides of the conflict’s front line, deepening a diplomatic rift ahead of a visit to Turkey by U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

This week’s talks, already challenging given disagreements over President Tayyip Erdogan’s crackdown after a failed 2016 coup, the detention of U.S. consulate staff and citizens, and the trial of a Turkish bank executive for evading U.S. sanctions on Iran, have been given added edge by the dispute over Syria.

Turkish and U.S. troops, deployed alongside local fighters, have carved out rival areas of influence on Syria’s northern border. To Ankara’s fury, Washington allied itself with a force led by the Kurdish YPG, a militia which Turkey says is commanded by the same leaders overseeing an insurgency in its southeast.

The dispute has come to a head over the Syrian town of Manbij, where Turkey has threatened to drive out a YPG-led force and warned the United States – which has troops there – not to get in the way.

“This is what we have to say to all our allies: don’t get in between us and terrorist organizations, or we will not be responsible for the unwanted consequences,” Erdogan said last month, days before launching a military offensive against the YPG in the northwestern Syrian region of Afrin.

Turkey would turn its attention to Manbij, about 100 km (60 miles) east of Afrin, “as soon as possible”, he said.

But Washington says it has no plans to withdraw its soldiers from Manbij, and two U.S. commanders visited the town last week to reinforce that message.

It has also warned that Turkey’s air and ground offensive in Afrin risks exacerbating a humanitarian crisis in Syria and disrupting one of the few corners of the country that had remained stable through seven years of civil war.

In a blunt but possibly understated assessment of Tillerson’s visit, a U.S. State Department official said Washington expected “a difficult conversation” in Ankara.

For Turkey, the dispute has pushed relations with the United States to breaking point.

“We will discuss these issues during Tillerson’s visit, and our ties are at a very critical stage,” Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Monday. “Either we will improve our ties, or they will completely deteriorate.”

“GUNG-HO” MILITARY

As the grievances between Washington and Ankara have escalated, Turkey has built bridges with rival powers Russia and Iran – even though their support has put Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad in the ascendancy while Turkey still backs the weakened rebels seeking his downfall.

The three countries agreed a so far ineffectual plan to wind down the fighting between the Syrian army, which is supported by Russian air power and Iran-backed militias, and jihadist fighters and Turkish-backed rebels.

Turkey says it also won agreement to launch its Afrin operation from Russia, which controls most of the air space in western Syria.

In contrast, it says the United States has yet to honor several pledges: for Washington to stop arming the YPG, to take back those arms after Islamic State was defeated in Syria, and to pull back YPG forces from Manbij.

Last week’s visit to Manbij by U.S. military commanders was a short-sighted and thoughtless “military gung-ho gesture”, according to Erdogan’s senior foreign policy adviser, Gulnur Aybet.

“It is not helpful, at a time when the United States and Turkey are trying to find common ground … for U.S. generals in the field to undertake a flippant and provocative display in Manbij next to the YPG,” she told Reuters.

Relations with the United States were “fragile and frustrating because pledges have been unfulfilled and there is a lack of coherence between the White House and the military”, Aybet said.

U.S. VIEWED UNFAVORABLY

Erdogan has also said Turkey will “strangle” a force which the United States plans to develop in the large sweep of northern Syria which the YPG and its allies currently control, including more than 400 km (250 miles) of the border with Turkey.

His tough language, a year before presidential and parliamentary elections, resonates in a country where 83 percent of people view the United States unfavorably, according to a poll published on Monday.

The poll for the Center for American Progress also found that 46 percent of Turks think their country should do more to confront the United States, compared with 37 percent who believe it should maintain the alliance.

That sentiment has underpinned Erdogan’s unyielding response to other disputes with Washington.

He has dismissed criticism of Turkey’s crackdown since the failed July 2016 coup, in which 250 people were killed, saying the response is justified by the security challenges Turkey faces.

The president has also said the U.S. court conviction of an executive of Turkey’s state-owned Halkbank for evading Iran sanctions was a “political coup attempt” which showed the U.S.-Turkish partnership was eroding.

In October he accused the U.S. consulate in Istanbul of sheltering an employee with links to U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, blamed by Ankara for last year’s failed coup. Turkey has sought the extradition of Gulen, who has denied any link to the coup attempt.

Turkey’s detention of two locally employed U.S. consulate workers – without providing evidence, according to Washington – led to the two countries suspending visa services. Even when services were resumed, they disagreed publicly over what assurances had been made to resolve their differences.

“The U.S.-Turkey alliance can no longer be taken for granted,” Ozgur Unluhisarcikli of the German Marshall Fund of the United States, which promotes transatlantic cooperation, wrote in a report published ahead of Tillerson’s trip.

“That this relationship has endured several stress tests in the past is no guarantee that it will survive this one”.

(THis story corrects spelling of adviser’s name in paragraph 16)

(Additional reporting by Tulay Karadeniz and Orhan Coskun in Ankara, and Yara Bayoumy in Washington; editing by Giles Elgood)

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)

U.S., Turkey mutually lift visa restrictions, ending months-long row

General view of the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, Turkey, December 20, 2016

By Ece Toksabay and Tuvan Gumrukcu

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – The United States and Turkey lifted all visa restrictions on Thursday after Washington said Ankara had kept to assurances no further U.S. mission staff would be targeted for performing official duties, following detention of two earlier this year.

But Turkey swiftly denied having granted such assurances in the affair that has tested relations since the two local employees of the U.S. consulate in Istanbul were held on suspicion of ties to last year’s failed coup against President Tayyip Erdogan.

The United States suspended visa services at its missions in Turkey in October and Turkey reciprocated. In November, Washington said it was resuming limited services upon getting assurances on the safety of its local staff.

“Based on adherence to these assurances, the Department of State is confident that the security posture has improved sufficiently to allow for the full resumption of visa services in Turkey,” the U.S. Embassy in Ankara said on Thursday.

It said the United States continued to have concerns about the two employees detained.

Turkey, while announcing the end of restrictions on the issue of visas to U.S. citizens, took issue with the U.S. declaration.

“We do not find it right for the United States to claim it had received assurances from Turkey and misinform the U.S. and Turkish publics,” the Turkish Embassy in Washington said in a statement.

Turkey’s lira firmed to 3.78 against the U.S. dollar after the statement, its highest level since Oct. 31, and the main share index BIST100 climbed 2.08 percent to reach its highest closing level ever.

Relations between the two NATO allies have become strained in the last year with Turkey angered by what it sees as the U.S. reluctance to hand over Fethullah Gulen, whom Turkey blames for the coup attempt in July of 2016.

Turkey was further annoyed by U.S. military support for Kurdish YPG fighters in Syria, considered by Ankara to be an extension of the banned PKK which has waged an insurgency for three decades in southeast Turkey.

More recently, Turkey took a leading role in the United Nations to pass a resolution denouncing a U.S. move to recognize Jerusalem as the Israeli capital.

(Writing by Ali Kucukgocmen; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

Turkish journalists go on trial accused of supporting terrorism

Journalists and press freedom activists release balloons during a demonstration in solidarity with the members of the opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet who were accused of supporting a terrorist group outside a courthouse, in Istanbul, Turkey, July 24, 2017.

By Can Sezer

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Prominent journalists and other staff at a Turkish opposition newspaper went on trial on Monday accused of supporting a terrorist group, in a case that critics of President Tayyip Erdogan consider attack on free speech.

“Journalism is not a crime,” chanted several hundred people gathered outside the central Istanbul court to protest against the prosecution of 17 writers, executives and lawyers of the secularist Cumhuriyet newspaper.

The trial coincides with an escalating dispute with Germany over the arrest in Turkey of 10 rights activists, including one German, as part of a crackdown since last year’s attempted coup against Erdogan.

Turkish prosecutors are seeking up to 43 years in jail for newspaper staff accused of targeting Erdogan through “asymmetric war methods”.

“I am not here because I knowingly and willingly helped a terrorist organisation, but because I am an independent, questioning and critical journalist,” one of the defendants, columnist Kadri Gursel, told the court.

Gursel, who, along with editor Murat Sabuncu and other senior staff, has been in pre-trial detention for 267 days, was prevented from hugging his son in the courtroom by security guards, the newspaper said on its website.

The 324-page indictment alleges Cumhuriyet was effectively taken over by the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, blamed for the failed putsch last July, and used to “veil the actions of terrorist groups”.

Gulen has denied any involvement in the coup.

The newspaper is also accused of writing stories that serve “separatist manipulation”.

Other defendants include Ahmet Sik, who once wrote a book critical of Gulen’s movement. Former editor Can Dundar, who is living in Germany, is being tried in absentia.

The newspaper has called the charges “imaginary accusations and slander”. Social media posts comprised the bulk of evidence in the indictment, along with allegations that staff had been in contact with users of Bylock, an encrypted messaging app the government says was used by Gulen’s followers.

 

‘DE FACTO COALITION’

“According to the government, everyone in opposition is a terrorist, the only non-terrorists are themselves,” Filiz Kerestecioglu, a member of parliament from the pro-Kurdish HDP opposition party, told reporters ahead of the trial.

Gursel, the columnist, denied he had links to Gulen’s movement, saying he had in the past revealed ties between Erdogan’s AK Party and the Gulen movement.

Erdogan has his roots in political Islam and was an ally of the cleric until a public falling-out in 2013.

“I exposed the current government’s de facto coalition with this group and I foresaw the harm that this sinister cooperation would do to the country,” he told the court.

Rights groups and Turkey’s Western allies have complained of deteriorating human rights under Erdogan. In the crackdown since last July’s failed coup, 50,000 people have been jailed pending trial and some 150,000 detained or dismissed from their jobs.

As part of the purge some 150 media outlets have been shut down and around 160 journalists are in jail, according to the Turkish Journalists’ Association.

The crackdown has strained Turkey’s ties with the European Union, but reaction from the bloc has been restrained because it depends on Turkey to curb the flow of migrants into Europe.

Europe’s leading power, Germany, has stepped up pressure in recent days, threatening measures that could hinder German investment in Turkey and reviewing Turkish applications for arms deals.

Turkish authorities say the crackdown is justified by the gravity of the coup attempt, in which rogue soldiers tried to overthrow the government and Erdogan, killing 250 people, most of them civilians.

 

(Writing by Daren Butler; Editing by Robin Pomeroy)

 

Turkish government extends state of emergency rule for another 3 months

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan chairs a National Security Council meeting in Ankara, Turkey, July 17, 2017

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey on Monday extended emergency rule for another three months, almost a year after it was imposed in the wake of last July’s failed military coup.

The government asked parliament to extend it for a fourth time and the proposal was approved by the assembly, where President ‘s AK Party has a comfortable majority.

The extension followed weekend ceremonies to mark the anniversary of the abortive coup in which around 250 people, mostly unarmed civilians, were killed.

Since emergency rule was imposed on July 20 last year, more than 50,000 people have been arrested and 150,000 people have been suspended in a crackdown which Erdogan’s opponents say has pushed Turkey on a path to greater authoritarianism.

The government says the purge is necessary to confront security challenges facing Turkey and to root out supporters of the U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen who it says was behind the coup attempt. Gulen has denied any involvement.

Speaking at parliament, Deputy Prime Minister Nurettin Canikli said the emergency rule had helped created the necessary legal environment to cleanse the state of Gulen’s network.

“All of those in the state’s high levels have been dismissed, but there are still hidden people,” Canikli said. In a series of public ceremonies to mourn people killed in the coup attempt and celebrate those who thwarted it, Erdogan defiantly stepped up his condemnation of the European Union and said he would bring back the death penalty if parliament approved it.

Ties with the West were strained when European governments voiced alarm at the scale of the crackdown. Another 7,000 police, civil servants and academics were dismissed last week according to a decree published on Friday.

 

(Reporting by Orhan Coskun and Gulsen Solaker; Writing by Dominic Evans and Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Ece Toksabay and Alison Williams)

 

Turkey targets foster families in post-coup crackdown

A damaged window is pictured at the police headquarters in Ankara, Turkey,

* Authorities investigating foster families over coup

* May remove children from families who backed coup

* Rights groups, EU rattled by extent of post-coup crackdown

By Gulsen Solaker

ANKARA, Nov 28 (Reuters) – Turkish authorities are investigating foster families for suspected ties to a failed coup and may remove children from homes if their guardians are found to be supporters of the putsch, a government official said on Monday.

The government has so far detained or dismissed 125,000 people over alleged links to the network of Fethullah Gulen, a U.S.-based Muslim cleric accused by Ankara of orchestrating the July 15 coup. Gulen, who lives in self-imposed exile in the state of Pennsylvania, has denied involvement in the putsch and condemned it.

“It would not be right for a child to remain with a (foster) family if links to FETO are confirmed as a result of the examinations,” the official from the Ministry of Family and Social Policy told Reuters.

The official, who declined to be identified, said the investigations had been going on since August 23.

“This is a slow process in which detailed examinations are being carried out. So it is out of the question for children to be suddenly ripped away from their families,” the official said, adding that the psychological health of the children was being closely monitored.

INVESTIGATION

Around 5,000 foster families and some related institutions are being investigated, the pro-government Yeni Safak newspaper reported. The government has also cut off cooperation with four childcare-related NGOs as part of its investigation, the newspaper said.

Last week European lawmakers voted for a temporary halt to EU membership talks with Turkey, citing Ankara’s “disproportionate” reaction to the coup over the past four months.

Luxembourg’s foreign minister said this month that Turkey’s handling of dismissed civil servants reminded him of methods used by the Nazis and that eventually the EU would have to respond with sanctions.

Such comments have infuriated Ankara, which has criticized Europe for a lack of solidarity following the coup. Erdogan last week warned the EU that Turkey could unleash a new wave of migrants on Europe if relations deteriorated further.

(Writing by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by David Dolan and Gareth
Jones)

From soldiers to midwives, Turkey dismisses 15,000 more

Turkish air force cadets march during a graduation ceremony for 197 cadets at the Air Force war academy in Istanbul, Turkey

By Tuvan Gumrukcu and Nick Tattersall

ANKARA/ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey dismissed 15,000 more state employees on Tuesday, from soldiers and police officers to tax inspectors and midwives, and shut 375 institutions and several news outlets, deepening purges carried out since a failed coup.

The dismissals, announced in two decrees, bring to more than 125,000 the number of people sacked or suspended in the military, civil service, judiciary and elsewhere since July’s coup attempt. About 36,000 have been jailed pending trial in the crackdown condemned by Western allies and rights groups.

President Tayyip Erdogan said the measures had significantly weakened the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whose followers are blamed by Ankara for infiltrating state institutions over several decades and carrying out the attempted putsch.

But he made clear the purges were not yet over.

“We know they have not been completely cleansed. They are still present in our military, in our police force, in our judiciary,” he told a conference on policing in his palace.

“We will not leave our country to them, we will not let them consume this nation. We will do whatever is necessary,” he said.

The coup and its aftermath have shaken confidence in the stability of Turkey, a NATO member key to the fight against Islamic State and a bulwark for Europe against the conflicts raging in neighbouring Syria and Iraq.

The crackdown has covered a vast range of professions – often where links to Gulen’s network are unclear – including doctors, nurses and midwives. Dismissals are announced in the Official Gazette with no reasons given beyond “membership of, or links to, terrorist organisations or groups deemed to be acting against national security interests”.

Some of the accused have been targeted for having accounts with a bank once controlled by Gulen’s followers, being members of an opposition union, or using a smartphone messaging app seen by the authorities as a Gulenist communications tool, according to Turkish media reports.

European allies have criticised the breadth of the purges, and EU parliament lawmakers called on Tuesday for a freezing of Turkey’s EU membership talks. A senior U.N. official has described the measures as “draconian” and “unjustified”.

Erdogan has rejected such criticism, saying Turkey is determined to root out its enemies at home and abroad, and could reintroduce the death penalty. He has accused Western nations of siding with coup plotters and of harbouring terrorists.

‘SOLD THEIR SOULS’

Ankara blames Gulen and his network, which it refers to as the “Gulenist Terror Organisation” (FETO), for the events of July 15, in which more than 240 people were killed as rogue soldiers commandeered tanks, fighter jets and helicopters, bombing parliament and other key buildings.

Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania in the United States since 1999, denies involvement.

“There is no place in this … land drenched with the blood of martyrs for those who sold their souls to Pennsylvania, the separatist terrorist organisation, or any other illegal organisation,” Erdogan said.

He frequently uses “Pennsylvania” as shorthand for the cleric’s network. The “separatist organisation” is a reference to the Kurdish PKK group, which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy in Turkey’s southeast.

Nearly 2,000 members of the armed forces, 7,600 police officers, 400 members of the gendarmerie, and more than 5,000 public workers, including nurses, doctors and engineers, were dismissed in Tuesday’s decrees for suspected links to terrorist organisations.

The Official Gazette made clear they would not be able to claim any severance or seek any other job in public service. The decrees were issued under the emergency rule imposed in the wake of the failed coup, which allows Erdogan and the government to bypass parliament.

Erdogan’s opponents say the purges go well beyond a crackdown on suspected Gulenists and are being used to crush dissent. Those accused are often unable to find other work and ostracised in their community, with Turkish media reports saying some have committed suicide before their trials can begin.

Pro-Kurdish politicians have been detained in a parallel crackdown, accused of links to the PKK, including the leaders of parliament’s second-largest opposition grouping the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP).

EUROPEAN OUTRAGE

On top of Tuesday’s decrees, authorities issued arrest warrants for 60 people, including air force pilots in the central city of Konya, over suspected Gulenist links. More than 300 pilots have already been detained or dismissed.

In another operation around Istanbul, 19 prison staff including the warden of Turkey’s largest jail Silivri were held on suspicion of using smartphone messaging app ByLock, which authorities say is used by Gulen’s network.

A trial also began on Tuesday of Gulen, in absentia, and 72 other people accused of trying to overthrow Turkey’s government. The case pre-dates the coup attempt, but is likely to be expanded to include charges related to the events of July 15.

Arrest warrants were also issued for 22 executives from telecoms firm Turk Telekom, the Hurriyet newspaper said. It said 12 of them had been detained in an operation spanning four provinces. Turk Telekom shares fell 0.7 percent, underperforming a 0.5 percent rise on the Istanbul stock index.

Tuesday’s decrees also announced the closure of 375 institutions or associations, including minority rights groups, lawyers’ associations and women’s groups. The decrees also shut 18 charities and nine media outlets. Turkey has closed more than 130 media outlets since July.

Guy Verhofstadt, head of the Liberals in the European Parliament, said the assembly was calling for EU officials to suspend negotiations with Turkey over membership of the bloc.

“Dozens of media outlets closed, members of parliament penalised or put in jail, there is a debate on the death penalty, there is more and more political control of the judiciary … Our relationship with Turkey becomes more and more of a liability,” he told a news conference on Tuesday.

(Additional reporting by Humeyra Pamuk in Istanbul, Jan Strupczewski in Brussels; Editing by Nick Tattersall and Pravin Char)

Turkey’s Erdogan says Germany has become ‘haven for terrorists’

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan makes a speech during his meeting with mukhtars at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey, October 19, 2016. Murat Cetinmuhurdar/Presidential Palace/

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday Germany had become a haven for terrorists and would be “judged by history”, accusing it of failing to root out supporters of a U.S.-based cleric Ankara blames for July’s failed military coup.

Erdogan said Germany had long harbored militants from the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy, and far-leftists from the DHKP-C, which has carried out armed attacks in Turkey.

“We are concerned that Germany, which has protected the PKK and DHKP-C for years, has become the backyard of the Gulenist terror organization,” Erdogan said, referring to the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen.

“We don’t have any expectations from Germany but you will be judged in history for abetting terrorism … Germany has become an important haven for terrorists,” he told a ceremony at his palace in the capital Ankara.

Ankara blames Gulen for the coup attempt and has suspended or dismissed more than 110,000 of his suspected followers from the civil service, security forces and other institutions in a crackdown. Gulen has denied involvement in the putsch.

German Justice Minister Heiko Maas told reporters on Tuesday that he did not want to judge whether the Gulenist movement was political in nature or not. He also said Berlin would not extradite suspects if they faced political charges.

“That would certainly not happen,” he said. For any extradition to take place, there had to be firm indications of “classic criminal activity”.

Erdogan said he was concerned by Germany’s reluctance, and warned that “the menace of terrorism would come back and strike it like a boomerang.”

(Reporting by Ece Toksabay and Tuvan Gumrukcu; Madeline Chambers in Berlin; Editing by Nick Tattersall)

Turkey issues detention warrants for 137 more academics over failed coup

A Turkish special forces police officer guards the entrance of the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey,

NKARA (Reuters) – Turkish authorities issued arrest warrants for 137 academics on Wednesday over suspected links to the cleric who Ankara says orchestrated an attempted coup, CNN Turk reported, widening a crackdown that has worried rights groups and Western allies.

Turkey has formally arrested more than 37,000 people and has already sacked or suspended 100,000 civil servants, judges, prosecutors, police and others in an unprecedented purge.

The government says it is rooting out supporters of Fethullah Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile in the United States since 1999, from the state apparatus and other key positions.

Gulen has denied Ankara’s charges and denounced the July failed coup by rogue members of the military.

Among the latest suspects, 31 of them have already been detained and another 22 are believed to have fled abroad, CNN Turk said, citing the Ankara Prosecutor’s Office. The prosecutor’s office could not be reached for comment.

Over the weekend, Turkey dismissed more than 10,000 civil servants over alleged links to Gulen. Thousands of academics, teachers and health workers were among those removed through a new emergency rule decree published late on Saturday.

(Reporting by Ece Toksabay; Editing by David Dolan and Richard Balmforth)