President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan held a phone conversation with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas over a recent escalation at the al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem.
Comment(s)7/20/2017
Turkish Presidential Spokesperson İbrahim Kalın said July 20 that the government did not leak any information to the state-run Anadolu Agency on the locations of U.S. bases in northern Syria
A man who had planned to stage an anti-drug march in the Central Anatolian province of Konya has turned out to be a drug dealer.
Turkey’s Foreign Ministry stated on July 20 that there had been a serious confidence crisis between Berlin and Ankara
Germany cannot continue as it had been in relations with Turkey, German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel said on July 20, pointing to the need for a new direction in Turkish policy.
The U.K. has informed Turkish officials that it would lift the electronics ban on flights from Turkey, state-run Anadolu Agency reported on July 20, citing diplomatic sources
The network of the U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen has been mentioned in the U.S. State Department’s annual report, the Country Reports on Terrorism 2016, for the first time, while not listing it among terrorist groups operating in Turkey.
Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has criticized the country’s new education curriculum, saying that Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of modern Turkey, was being left out of it.
No new libraries have opened in 44 provinces of Turkey over the last 10 years, according to the data from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism
“The Ideological Codes of the PKK,” the latest book by Turkish journalist Fikret Bilâ, which offers an in depth look into how the Syrian wing of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) has managed to attract young recruits from the western world, has been published by Doğan Kitap in the English language
A village in the Black Sea province of Gümüşhane’s Torul district has been mourning the death of a teacher who was killed by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in eastern Turkey.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan reappointed Yekta Saraç as the head of Turkey’s Higher Education Board (YÖK) on July 20
DIPLOMACY
NICOSIA
Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said July 20 that Turkish Cyprus could depend on Ankara for support and said Turkey would “continue protecting the rights of Turkish Cypriots in the Eastern Mediterranean.”
Comment(s) 7/20/2017
LOCAL
ANKARA
A special unit in the Turkish Armed Forces is slated to be formed to clear members of the Fethullahist Terrorist Organization (FETÖ) from the military, daily Milliyet reported on July 20
Turkish Gendarmerie Commander Gen. Yaşar Güler has offered giving medals to commanders who clashed with the plotters of the July 15, 2016, coup attempt on the night of the thwarted coup.
CoE Secretary-General Thorbjorn Jagland spoke to PM Yıldırım over the phone late July 19 to express his concerns over the arrest of human rights activists as well as the situation of two educators who have been on hunger strike for 134 days in prison.
BERLIN - Reuters
It is extremely difficult for German companies to make investments in Turkey under the current political climate in the country, German Economy Minister Brigitte Zypries said on July 20.
Turkey has welcomed the removal of a demand to shut down the Turkish base in Qatar from a list of demands imposed by Saudi Arabia and four other countries on the gas-rich country, calling it a positive move.
Turkey on July 20 accused Greek Cyprus of taking “dangerous” steps in its search for energy resources in the Mediterranean, two weeks after crunch talks aimed at reunifying the divided island collapsed, as reported by AFP
TUNCELİ
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has thanked a main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) deputy in a phone call over a speech he delivered in parliament about a teacher who had been abducted and killed by outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants in the eastern province of Tunceli
Turkey’s media watchdog Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) cancelled licenses for five TV channels, after the latter did not heed the council’s broadcasting ban of 10 days, state-run Anadolu Agency reported on July 20.
ANKARA - Anadolu Agency
Turkey’s Zorlu Energy has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Palestine’s electricity distribution company JDECO for the construction and operation of solar power plants to provide electricity to Palestine, the company announced on July 19.
OPINION - all the columnists »
A cabinet reshuffle has been discussed since before the April 16 constitutional referendum, which consolidated all executive powers in President Tayyip Erdoğan’s hands
On the first anniversary of the July 15 coup attempt; I was invited by international media outlets to share my views
There is a common point that connects the July 15, 2016, coup attempt’s civilian executive staff who spent the night of the attempted takeover at the Akıncı air base and was then caught by the gendarmerie forces on the morning of July 16, 2016, at the open field near the base with each other. The connection is fiscal relations.
The latest attempt to reunite Cyprus failed intense negotiations in Crans-Montana, Switzerland, on July 7. The quintet talks under the auspices of U.N. Secretary-General was seen as the most promising occasion in years with two solution-minded leaders, Nicos Anastasiades of the Republic of Cyprus (RoC) and Mustafa Akıncı of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC), in power on both sides of the divided island
The German media has started to talk about negotiations. The German public broadcaster ARD has directly asked the German premier if there are negotiations with Turkey.
Lately, I have written that it would be better if the Istanbul Municipality did not enter competition with private entrepreneurs
We have a characteristic that ruins, renders ugly, complicates and transforms what is beautiful and exemplary into a bad example in a very short time
The first anniversary of the July 15, 2016, coup attempt is over but there are still unanswered questions about it, which makes it more difficult to understand what actually happened that night and how the Gülenists, who are accused of plotting the coup, managed to stage it
Comment(s)7/19/2017
Radiohead defied calls to boycott Israel over its occupation of Palestinian territory and played for tens of thousands in Tel Aviv on July 19, with singer Thom Yorke having dismissed critics as patronizing
AIDS claimed a million lives in 2016, almost half the 2005 toll that marked the peak of the deadly epidemic, said a U.N. report on July 20 proclaiming “the scales have tipped."
Six Syrian actors battled a fraught U.S. visa process to tread the boards in New York this week, seeking to impress on American theater goers the human cost of a war raging halfway round the world
The Hogwarts universe is set to expand by an additional two new Harry Potter books, published in conjunction with a British Library event, in celebration of the 20th anniversary of the magical series
An excavation in the Dargeçit district of the southeastern region of Turkey, which will soon be left under the reservoir waters of the Ilısu Dam, has revealed crucial information about the North Mesopotamian people’s social life 10 millennia ago, particularly about burial rituals and the ancient belief in life after death
The 24th Istanbul Jazz Festival will finish with a concert on July 21, featuring the Syrian Women’s Chorus, composed of Syrian women who migrated to Istanbul
Madonna asked a judge on July 18 to block an auction of memorabilia including a breakup letter from rapper Tupac Shakur, saying the intimate items were stolen by her former friend
The population of one of the world’s rarest species has been boosted with the birth of a northern hairy-nosed wombat joey, Australian wildlife officials said on July 19
The Bank of England on July 18 unveiled a new bank note featuring Jane Austen to coincide with the author’s death 200 years ago after a campaign to include more women on Britain’s currency