Protesters accused of links with militants
PKK kills 3 ‘forces’
ANKARA, May 25, (Agencies): Turkey’s interior minister said on Thursday two teachers detained after more than two months on a hunger protest over a government crackdown in which they lost their jobs have links to the leftist militant group DHKP-C.
Literature professor Nuriye Gulmen and primary school teacher Semih Ozakca were detained on Monday and jailed pending trial on Tuesday. They lost their jobs in a purge following a failed July coup against President Tayyip Erdogan.
The teachers have been living on a liquid diet of lemon and saltwater and sugar solutions. Doctors say they have lost weight and their health is deteriorating.
Speaking in the Black Sea province of Trabzon, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said the two teachers had participated in activities organised by the DHKPC prior to their dismissal, and had been members of the militant group since 2012 — an accusation challenged by their lawyer.
“There are organic ties between these two persons and the DHKP-C terrorist organisation ... It is very clear,” Soylu said.
The DHKP-C, founded in 1978, is listed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the United States and the European Union. The group aims to set up a socialist state in Turkey and supports violent means to do so.
Selcuk Kozagacli, a lawyer representing the teachers, told Reuters Gulmen and Ozakca had both been acquitted of the charges mentioned by the ministers in 2012.
Complaint
He said a criminal complaint about the accusations would be submitted to a court in Ankara today. Applications would be filed to Turkey’s constitutional court and the European Court of Human Rights next week.
The teachers, who now both use wheelchairs because of their deteriorating health, say their hunger strike is aimed at highlighting the plight of 150,000 state employees suspended or sacked after the failed putsch, which Erdogan blames on followers of USbased cleric Fethullah Gulen.
While Turkish officials say the purges are necessary due to the gravity of the coup attempt which killed 240 people, critics in Turkey and abroad say Erdogan is using the coup as a pretext to muzzle dissent and purge opponents.
20-year jail urged for hunger strikers:
Turkish prosecutors on Wednesday demanded up to 20 years in jail on terror charges for an academic and a teacher who have been on hunger strikes for over two months to protest their dismissal in a purge after last year’s failed coup.
Nuriye Gulmen and Semih Ozakca were remanded in custody late Tuesday ahead of trial by an Ankara court on charges of “membership of a terror organisation”. They had initially been detained on Monday.
In their indictment, Ankara prosecutors asked for up to 20 years jail for the pair, charging them with membership in a terror group, terror propaganda and breaking the law on demonstrations, the state-run Anadolu news agency said.
They are specifically accused of membership of the Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), an outlawed Marxist group which has staged sporadic attacks over the last years.
PKK kills 3 security forces:
Two Turkish soldiers and a policeman have been killed in two separate clashes with Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants in eastern Turkey, security sources said on Thursday.
Early on Thursday, PKK fighters opened fire in a mountainous area of Agri province’s Dogubayazit district, near the Iranian border, killing two soldiers and wounding four others, the sources said. A day earlier, a special forces police officer was killed in a clash in a mountainous area of Sirnak province’s Beytussebap district, near the Iraqi border, they said.
A ceasefire between the Turkish state and the militants broke down in July 2015 and the southeast subsequently saw some of the worst violence since the PKK launched its insurgency in 1984.
More than 40,000 people, mostly Kurds, have been killed in the conflict. The PKK is designated a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.
Convicted journalist detained:
Turkish authorities on Wednesday detained a fugitive magazine editor who was trying to cross into Greece, two days after he was sentenced to over 22 years in jail in a controversial case, state media said.
Nokta magazine’s managing editor Murat Capan was detained along with four others while trying to “illegally” cross into Greece by land in the Uzunkorpru district of Edirne Province, the Anadolu news agency said.
Along with the magazine’s editor-in-chief Cevheri Guven, Capan had been given a 22-and-a-half-year sentence on Monday by an Istanbul court on charges of seeking to provoke an armed rebellion against the Turkish republic.
Neither were in court for the verdict and the whereabouts of Guven was not immediately clear.
Accusations
Four other people — who face accusations of links to Fethullah Gulen, the alleged mastermind of the failed July 2016 coup — were also detained in the sweep by Turkish border police in Edirne Province. The US-based Gulen denies any link to the coup attempt.
Guven and Capan had been released in December 2015 pending trial in the case, the latest controversy to raise concerns over press freedoms under the rule of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
German MPs cancel visit:
German lawmakers cancelled a visit to Turkey where they had planned to talk to opposition lawmakers, governors and rights groups about last month’s referendum, saying Ankara had refused to give them a security detail.
Claudia Roth, a Green Party lawmaker and vice president of the Bundestag (German lower house), said on Wednesday Turkish officials had informed her the German delegation would have neither access to parliament in Ankara nor security guards.
The visit’s cancellation is likely to further strain relations between the two NATO allies that have deteriorated over Turkey’s refusal to allow German parliamentarians access to troops based at the Incirlik air base.