'Heretics' - World's leading Sunni clerics declare 'Wahhabism is not Sunnism'.

Italian map of Arabic Peninsula 1918 shows that Muslim schools (Hanbali,Wahabi,Hanafi,Shafii,Shiite)lived separately pic.twitter.com/d4hEO2Vegy

— Joumana Gebara (@JoumanaGebara) September 10, 2016

'Heretics' - World's leading Sunni clerics declare 'Wahhabism is not Sunnism'. (RT).

At the end of August, a meeting of Muslim clerics and scholars convened in the Chechen capital of Grozny to forge a consensus on the subject of ‘who constitutes a Sunni.’

Sunnism, the 200 or so Sunni clerics from Egypt, South Africa, India, Europe, Turkey, Jordan, Yemen, Russia warned, “has undergone a dangerous deformation in the wake of efforts by extremists to void its sense in order to take it over and reduce it to their perception.”

The Muslim world is currently under a siege of terror, led by a deviant strain that claims religious authority and kills in the name of Islam.

So the Grozny participants had gathered, by invitation of the Chechen president, to make “a radical change in order to re-establish the true meaning of Sunnism.”

If their final communique was any indicator, the group of distinguished scholars had a very particular message for the Muslim world: Wahhabism - and its associated takfirism - are no longer welcome within the Sunni fold.

Specifically, the conference’s closing statement says this: “Ash’arites and the Maturidi are the people of Sunnism and those who belong to the Sunni community, both at the level of the doctrine and of the four schools of Sunni jurisprudence (Hanafi, Hanbali, Shafi’i, Maliki), as well as Sufis, both in terms of knowledge and moral ethics."

In one fell swoop, Wahhabism, the official state religion of only two Muslim countries -Saudi Arabia and Qatar - was not part of the majority Muslim agenda any longer.

The backlash from the Saudis came hard and fast, honing in on the participation of Egypt’s Grand Imam Ahmed al-Tayeb of Al Azhar, the foremost center for Sunni theological study in the Islamic world.

Saudi Arabia has, after all, subsidized the flailing Egyptian economy to the tune of billions of dollars in the past few years, alongside its Wahhabi neighbor Qatar, which has in turn bank-rolled the Muslim Brotherhood – a group also excluded from the Grozny meeting.

While Tayeb did not single out the Saudis in his conference speech, his elevated position in the global Sunni hierarchy lent a great deal of weight to the proceedings. And Al Azhar’s prominence in the Sunni world is rivaled only by the relatively new role of the Al Saud monarch as the custodian of the two holy sites, Mecca and Medina.

Just last year – in Mecca, no less - Tayeb slammed extremist trends during a speech on terrorism, lashing out at “corrupt interpretations” of religious texts and appealing to believers “to tackle in our schools and universities this tendency to accuse Muslims of being unbelievers.”

It is Wahhabism that is most often accused of sponsoring this trend globally.

The radical sect, borne in the 18th century, deviates from traditional Sunni doctrine in various ways, most notably sanctioning violence against nonbelievers - including Muslims who reject Wahhabi interpretation (takfirism).

Saudi Arabia is the single largest state contributor to tens of thousands of Wahhabi-influenced mosques, schools, clerics and Islamic publications scattered throughout the Muslim world – many of them, today, feeders for terrorist recruitment. By some accounts that figure has reached almost $100 billion in the last three decades or so.

In Grozny, conference participants made reference to this dangerous trend, and called for a “return to the schools of great knowledge" outside Saudi Arabia – in Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and Yemen.

Saudi officialdom took to social media to express their outrage. Saudi royal, Prince Khalid al-Saud, warned that the event represented “a conspiracy that openly targets our country and it's religious standing, specifically.” Hmmm..........Could be a good start. Read the full story here.

"Advanced Islamist Democracy" Turkey's new plan to give incentives to women marrying early!

"Advanced Islamist Democracy" Turkey's new plan to give incentives to women marrying early! (AlMonitor).

The Justice and Development Party government is offering incentives to encourage university students to get married before graduation and to have more than three children.

Erdogan who was then prime minister told the girls: "Don’t delay your marriage. Decide quickly and marry while you are studying or immediately after graduation — the minute you find your destiny [kismet]. Don’t be too selective. If you are, you won’t achieve it.”

Immediately after Erdogan's remarks at TURGEV, the Ministry of Families and Social Policies announced a subsidy of 10,000 Turkish lira ($4,000) to couples that marry early.

An additional carrot was offered by Davutoglu who said home savings accounts will be offered to young married couples, with the government adding 15% to the amount saved in five years, if the account remains untouched. If the money in the account is taken out within four years, the subsidy will be 10% and it is reduced to 5% if used in three years.

Another promise Davutoglu made in a series of incentives was to reward childbearing mothers with gold coins.

Davutoglu explained: “Each mother after giving birth will receive 300 lira [$120] as a gift from the state. That equals half a gold coin. This gift will be [increased to] 400 lira [$160] for the second child and 600 lira [$240] for the third. It will be the state that will pin the first gold coin on the mother and the baby.” Hmmm......I wonder when they will introduce the Cross of Honor of the Turkish Mother? Ein Ummah ....Ein Fuhrer? Read the full story here.

Tunisian newspaper: "Islamic State Selling Iraqi, Syrian Children to Israel"

Tunisian newspaper: "Islamic State Selling Iraqi, Syrian Children to Israel" (RN).

The Islamic State (IS) is engaged in the sale of abducted Iraqi and Syrian children to Israel, Tunisian newspaper Al-Chourouk reported. The IS trades people through Israeli intermediaries associated with smuggling, the newspaper said Thursday.

Israeli middlemen then sell the children to childless families. According to the newspaper's sources, the head of the syndicate is an Israeli lawyer who is under protection of some rabbis.

According to the newspaper, one child costs $10,000. The IS also sells women, but they cost less compared to children. The IS commanders also marry the most beautiful women of those abducted.

According to the latest UN report on the situation in the region, more than 25,000 women and children have been taken captive. They are sexually abused and sold into slavery. The IS is also suspected of human organs trafficking, the newspaper reported.

The IS is a sectarian Sunni Muslim militia also known at the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) or the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

It seized large parts of Iraq and Syria and proclaimed an Islamic caliphate on the areas under its control. The group's rapid advance in northern Iraq triggered a response from Washington, which launched airstrikes against the insurgents fighting on the Iraqi soil in August. The military campaign was subsequently extended to Syria, with an international coalition set up to defeat the extremists. Hmmm....Don't know if the MSM missed this story, but shows you again the kind of 'crap' Islamists are spreading in the Middle East.

'Islamist' Turkish Directorate of Religious Affairs subjects pilgrims to 'State' propaganda.

'New Turkey'

'Islamist' Turkish Directorate of Religious Affairs subjects pilgrims to 'State' propaganda. HT: TodaysZaman.

A group of Turkish religious pilgrims who undertook hajj, or religious pilgrimage, organized by a foundation connected to the Directorate of Religious Affairs say they have been subjected political propaganda by having their access to TV restricted to only pro-government media outlets.

The group took part in the pilgrimage through one of the directorate's foundations based in the Netherlands. Participants say the directorate's Al Mostafa Tower Hotel in Mecca only gave access to the A Haber news channel, a pro-government media outlet.

Talking with Today's Zaman, Alper Metin -- who for hajj traveled to Saudi Arabia from Rotterdam with the directorate's foundation -- said that all TVs in the hotel rooms and common places only had the A Haber channel, a news outlet that is in support of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party).

Metin objected to Kaşıkçı's remarks, saying that only the pro-government TRT1, TRT SPOR, ATV, SKYTÜRK, TGRT and A Haber TV channels were on the list, but that no private channels like NTV, CNN Türk, Habertürk or Kanal 7 were represented. “The pilgrimage is not the place for political propaganda,” Metin said.

When asked about the selection of A Haber, which is known for its pro-government policy and debates, directorate official Kaşıkçı declined to answer and promptly ended the phone interview with Today's Zaman. Hmmm.......Can't wait till the 'Directorate of Religious affairs' start serving this TV selection to tourists.....'Bon Appetit' Read the full story here.

Video - Young Boy Pledges Allegiance to terrorist group ISIS

Obama 'Admin' BFF Qatar: 'State Sponsor of Terrorism'

Obama 'Admin' BFF Qatar: 'State Sponsor of Terrorism' HT: MoneyJihad.

We’ve known about Qatar’s funding of Al Qaeda-linked Syrian rebels from the outset of the uprising against Bashar al-Assad. The piece below from the Oriental Review puts Qatar’s role in even starker terms, pointing to a history of clandestine financing of militants by Qatar since at least the 1990s.

Like Saudi Arabia, Qatar is a state sponsor of terrorism all but in name, and should be legally designated as such. Keep in mind that Qatar isn’t just funding the rebels in Syria that the U.S. supports, but that Doha is also supporting the jihadists in Mali who are fighting America’s longtime ally, France.

if we go back a few years further, we find that Qatar was on the US list of state sponsors of terrorism. It was only taken off the list because it offered to host a US naval base — the largest one in the region — which was used as a command post during the 2003 operation by forces of the United States and its allies to occupy Iraq.

Huge amounts of money from natural gas sales enabled the Qataris get the “leader” of the global antiterrorist coalition to turn a blind eye on all of Doha’s transgressions in the sacred cause of assisting the “brothers” in sharing the Salafi faith everywhere — from Africa to Kashmir.

If we can trust documents on the WikiLeaks site, in 2008 the former US ambassador to Doha, Joseph LeBaron, cabled the State Department that Qatar was still financing international terrorism. Leaks of his cables published by the Qatari newspaper Peninsula in 2010 generated an exchange of remarks between LeBaron and its chief editor. But the US ambassador left, and Washington simply hushed the matter up.

if we apply the international legal norms to Qatar’s activities, we find that they actually meet the legal definition of sponsoring international terrorism as spelled out in several UN Security Council resolutions and other international community documents. Doha’s provision of money and weapons to terrorist groups like Jabhat al-Nusra qualifies as financing international terrorism. Read the full story here.

Turkey's BDP co-leader: “It is Turkey’s support that created al-Qaeda,”

Turkey's BDP co-leader: “It is Turkey’s support that created al-Qaeda,”(HD).

If the Turkish government was really sending humanitarian aid to Turkmen in Syria in trucks that the police attempted to seize two weeks ago, they would surely “show off” their efforts, Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) leader Selahattin Demirtaş has said, expressing skepticism over the government’s account of the episode.

“If the trucks were loaded with aid, they would trumpet them with celebrations and with live broadcasts. Would the Justice and Development Party (AKP) carry aid to Syrians in a hidden way?” Demirtaş asked, addressing BDP lawmakers at Parliament.

“Everybody is aware that the trucks weren’t loaded with aid. The entire world knows they were carrying arms to gangs,” he added, noting that the intelligence organization’s duty was not to “give confidential aid to gangs.”

The Turkish government, which complains about oppression by the Syrian regime, is as guilty as Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, as it gives support to “others who also suppress the Syrian people,” Demirtaş stated, referring to al-Qaeda groups in Syria.

“It is Turkey’s support that created al-Qaeda,” the BDP co-leader said, claiming that the Turkish government had lent support to extremist groups across the Turkish-Syrian border.

“They didn’t do this in order to establish a power against al-Assad. Their biggest fear was about Kurds [in Syria],” Demirtaş said.

“[The Turkish government], which has supported gangs [in Syria] is aiming to prevent the Kurds from gaining power, but has been hoisted by its own petard,” he added.

Main opposition leader accuses Turkish PM Erdogan of being ‘gang leader’ .

Turkey...The next Egypt?

Main opposition leader accuses Turkish PM Erdogan of being ‘gang leader’.(HD).

Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu described the prime minister as “the head of the gang of corruption” during a rally in Balıkesir on Jan. 19.

“We know what this government is doing. We know what you are doing. You are the gang leader. I also know that very well,” Kılıçdaroğlu said.

He claimed that on Dec. 17, the day when a gripping graft probe became public with a string of detentions, including those of some ministers’ sons, Turkey “met a reality” for the first time.

“This is the day when the Turkish government robbed the state. Four Cabinet ministers were caught red-handed during corruption,” the CHP head said.

Kılıçdaroğlu added that the local elections on March 30 were the democratic means through which to hold the government to account for this.

“We [the CHP] have a family insurance project. For each household with no income, or with an income less than the minimum wage, we pledge to put 600 Turkish Liras in the bank each month, so that they would not be in a ‘begging’ position. They ask us, ‘How will we find this money?’ Well, the money robbed in the recent graft incident is 247 billion liras, although the actual figure may be more … Who knows the true figure? The ones who stole it know,” he said.

"State Sponsor of Terrorism?" - Turkish gendarmerie stops seven Syria-bound trucks, finds weapons and ammunition.

"State Sponsor of Terrorism?" - Turkish gendarmerie stops seven Syria-bound trucks, finds weapons and ammunition.(TZ).

Turkish gendarmerie forces have intercepted five Syria-bound trucks on suspicion of arms shipment in the southern province of Adana on Sunday, in the latest of similar incidents pointing to mounting concerns of unabated attempts for transfer of arms to the opposition fighters battling the Syrian regime for nearly three years.

Turkish gendarmerie forces found weapons and ammunition on seven trucks they stopped in the southern province of Adana on Sunday after receiving a tip that the trucks were transporting arms to Syria.

According to news portal T24, the gendarmerie stopped and searched the three trucks on Sunday morning. Later in the day, the gendarmerie stopped and searched four more trucks.

T24 reported that police detained three journalists, one each from the private Doğan news agency, the state-run Anadolu news agency and Başkent TV, who were trying to shoot video and stills of the incident. Police also confiscated the memory cards in the journalists' cameras, T24 said. The journalists later were released, but their memory cards were not returned.

According to T24, after the gendarmes discovered a large quantity of weapons, the trucks were brought to the Seyhan gendarmerie compound in Adana. Two of the trucks were filled with ammunition, while another was carrying weapons, T24 said.

T24 claimed that the search was conducted on the order of a public prosecutor and that the weapons and ammunition were headed for Syria. The site also reported that an Audi automobile had been following the trucks and belongs to Turkey's National Intelligence Organization (MİT).  

Before searching the trucks, the gendarmerie took security measures to prevent an explosion, using jammers to block phone signals, the report said.

CNN Türk reported late on Sunday that the trucks stopped by the gendarmerie were carrying humanitarian aid and had been dispatched by MİT, without elaborating.

The report came amid a clampdown by Turkish security forces on arms shipments across the Syrian border. Turkey has faced mounting international criticism for being soft on radical groups crossing its porous borders.
Turkish gendarmes reportedly discovered weapons and ammunition on a truck bound for Syria in the southern province of Hatay on Jan. 1, 2014. Acting on a tip, the gendarmes stopped a truck on a road between Kırıkhan and Reyhanlı near the Syrian border. A significant amount of ammunition and weapons were discovered, according to local reports.Hmmm.......Iran FM: Tehran to release documents on supporters of Takfiri terrorists

'Mission Impossible' for Turkey's Ambassadors

'Mission Impossible' for Turkey's Ambassadors.(AL Monitor). By Cengiz Candar.

For some six years, Turkey's ambassadors in all corners of the globe have been coming to Ankara in the second week of January to listen to top officials of the country and other speakers deemed appropriate by Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu.

Since the tendency in Turkey is to see the diplomatic elite as "Westernized," after the Ankara meeting, the ambassadors are taken on a tour of Anatolia. This is the way the AKP government has come up with to train this group of people, who are seen as removed from national values or over cosmopolitan because of their Westernized orientation to the realities of their homeland.

This time, the ambassadors first met in Ankara Jan. 15 before traveling to the Adana and Mersin provinces, not far from the Syrian border. The feature of this sixth session that set it apart from earlier ones was Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's lecture, which sounded like an appeal for help from the ambassadors.

Erdogan faces lots of dilemmas these days. Although he uprooted and reassigned thousands of policemen in the middle of the winter in reaction to the graft probe launched in December, an investigation he labeled a "coup" against his government, and took suppressive and restrictive actions against prosecutors and judges and reassigned some prosecutors, the prime minister has not been freed from his troubles.

While the graft probe was inhibited, the police refused to carry out instructions to pursue the investigations and the prosecutors responsible for the investigations were transferred to other posts, the media began receiving tapes of Erdogan's telephone conversations. The tapes were obviously leaked to give the impression of illegal or dubious acts. They seem to be working.

The course Erdogan chose to combat these developments is a tough one. He has been able, by the exhaustive use and even abuse of executive powers, to carry out his "bureaucratic cleansing," but he couldn't find any way to change the structure of the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) and fully control the judiciary. 

The structure of HSYK was changed with a constitutional referendum that won 58% support in 2010. It won't be easy for Erdogan to again change the structure of the HSYK three years later without amending the constitution. The European Union sees his efforts as Turkey giving up on the supremacy of law and the independence of the judiciary.

And what did Erdogan come up with to prevent the leaking of his telephone conversations, which could lead to questions about the legitimacy of his actions? He decided to enact an "Internet law" that would put Turkey in the same category as China, Saudi Arabia and Iran, which will not be well received in Europe.

For today's Turkey to totally turn its back on Europe is not that easy an option, even if Erdogan is willing to let his country turn away from the European model and become more like the rest of the Middle East.

For Erdogan, the best way to preserve and sustain his rule is to persuade the outside world, especially the West, that the corruption probe is nothing but a coup attempt by disciples of Fethullah Gulen's faith community.

This is why he is now trying to enlist Turkey's diplomatic elite. When lecturing the ambassadors, he said the changes the government is trying to make in the judiciary do not amount to intervention, but a struggle against the "illicit structure" within the judiciary. 

He explained, "The real nature of this organization must be deciphered and exposed also outside of this country. It is important for your audience to well understand this unlawful organization whose structure, activities, goals and desires are clearly known and whose perils have become obvious. 

The empire of fear this organization has been building within the state security and judiciary bodies in such areas as politics, economy, finance and trade must be well explained. We want you to especially emphasize that the systematic conveying of information in English and other languages to foreign countries is nothing but disinformation and should not be given credit. We will of course do our part to discredit that disinformation. But the real burden, the real responsibility is undoubtedly on your shoulders, the ambassadors."

Erdogan has thus placed an extremely heavy burden on Turkey's ambassadors. The same ambassadors for many years have been under instructions to promote the schools and activities of the Gulen movement as Turkey's "biggest and most effective lobbying operation" and to support them.

At this point, an article by Abdulrahman al-Rashed under the title "Erdogan's Arab allies disappointed" seem applicable. Rashed wrote, "Using his jurisdiction as prime minister, Erdogan fired those who investigated him, his ministers and their sons in the case of the Iranian funds. He also presented a bill to place the judiciary under the supervision of the head of the government -- that is under his supervision! 

If the judiciary, police and media are all corrupt, then what state did Erdogan govern? If the Gulen movement is under suspicion and taking orders from the US government, then how did he ally with it and achieve governance all these years?"

If the ambassadors are asked these questions, how are they to answer?

The alleged coup is alternately referred to by Erdogan and his spokesmen in the Turkish media as a "global assassination," "international conspiracy" of US, US-Israeli, or Western origin in general. The Gulen movement -- according to such allegations -- is no more than a heinous domestic instrument used to implement the international plot against Erdogan or Turkey itself.

But then, aren't some of the listeners our ambassadors are to brief representatives of this "international conspiracy?"

Erdogan saved his strongest ripostes for accusations that Turkey had been assisting al-Qaeda elements in Syria. As expected, he denied those charges outright, saying in his speech to the ambassadors, "The gangs of treachery are carrying out a dastardly campaign to spread the perception that Turkey is aiding international terror ... with al-Qaeda, Jabhat al-Nusra or whatever. All of those are actually against us, and we are against them."

The same day Erdogan was saying this, The Wall Street Journal and the BBC reported that some European intelligence services had been to Damascus several times since November, although Syrian government sources claim the conversations dealt with counter-terrorism cooperation on jihadists coming to Syria from Europe.

Also on the same day, the Erdogan government reassigned within hours the anti-terror police official who carried out an operation against al-Qaeda network in the town of Kilis. A day before, the Syrian town of Tal Abiyad, right on the Turkish border, and its provincial capital Raqqa had fallen under the control of the Islamic State of Iraq and Sham (ISIS).

It is true that Turkey has taken a position against ISIS. But how firmly Turkey opposes al-Qaeda's other Syrian extension, Jabhat al-Nusra, and the Islamic Front, which have been clashing with ISIS, needs to be elaborated.

At least, we now know that Western intelligence services have chosen Turkey's key foe, Damascus, as a partner in cooperation against al-Qaeda.

This outlook will make it difficult not only for Erdogan to find support for his claims of a coup, but also for our ambassadors, who the prime minister has designated as the real carriers of the burden.

Erdogan's 'Islamic Turkey' enforces Internet & news censorship off protests across Turkey.

Erdogan's 'Islamic Turkey' enforces Internet censorship off protests across Turkey. Istanbul,Izmir,Ankara,Samsun,Bursa,Antalya,Mersin,Denizli,Eskisehir,Izmit,Antakya.

EU may halt negotiations with Erdogan's Turkey, but does not want to.

EU may halt negotiations with Erdogan's Turkey, but does not want to.(Taz).

European Union Commissioner for Enlargement and European Neighborhood Policy Stefan Füle has warned that the EU may halt negotiations with Turkey but that the EU does not want to do it because it would be a difficult process to restart once you halt the negotiations, according to sources, Today's Zaman reported.

Füle had a meeting on Tuesday with the members of the Friends of Turkey in the European Parliament (EP), and his warning about the possibility of halting Turkey's EU negotiations came up during this meeting, Today's Zaman has learned. Friends of Turkey is an informal group founded by members of the EP with the main interest of following the negotiation process between the EU and Turkey through a critical and constructive approach.

According to EU sources, Füle said the EU does not want to halt the negotiations with Turkey because once you freeze the process it would be very difficult to restart.

At the meeting in which eight deputies from the Friends of Turkey group and many bureaucrats attended, Füle said 2014 has not started well for Turkey and that the Dec. 17 corruption operation is a "highly complex investigation," without elaborating much.

According to sources talking to Today's Zaman, Füle also said what the Turkish government is doing with regards to the corruption investigation is damaging the independence of the judiciary and the separation of powers.

A police operation was launched on Dec. 17 in which state-run Halkbank General Manager Süleyman Aslan, Iranian businessman Reza Zarrab and the sons of two Cabinet ministers were arrested along with 20 other suspects.

When the corruption investigation erupted, the prime minister sought to discredit the investigation by calling it a "foreign plot" and "an attempt to damage the government made by a parallel state nested within the state."

He immediately ordered the removal of hundreds of police officers who had contributed to the probe. The Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) initiated an investigation into four prosecutors involved in the corruption probe, and two of the prosecutors were removed from the case.

In addition, the government issued a proposal to restructure the HSYK. If adopted, the bill will give the government a tighter grip on the judiciary, according to legal experts.

Füle tweeted on Monday he had asked the Turkish "authorities [to] consult relevant amendments to laws before adoption to make sure they're in line with principles of EU legislation."

Speaking to Today's Zaman on Thursday, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Nils Muiznieks also said that adopting a government-endorsed bill to restructure the HSYK is a huge step backwards for Turkey that not only undermines the independence and impartiality of the judiciary and transfers certain powers to the executive but will also undermine public trust and confidence in the judiciary.

When speaking to the Friends of Turkey group, Füle said he talked to President Abdullah Gül and Deputy Prime Minister Ali Babacan on the phone recently and highlighted the issues about which EU is concerned, such as police reassignments, HSYK restructuring and removing certain prosecutors from the investigations.

Liberal Democrat member of the EP for the Southwest of England Graham Watson, who was in the same meeting with Füle, also said center-right parties may ask to halt the EU negotiations with Turkey in the coming days and the center left may support it.

"Turkey will not give up pursuing EU membership," said Turkey's EU Affairs Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu on Friday at the plenary session of the Economic Development Foundation (İKV).
"The EU is the biggest modernization project for Turkey. In order to have success in Turkey's EU process, we need a timetable rather than good will remarks. The process should not be open ended," Çavuşoğlu added.
Çavuşoğlu said that the messages coming from the EU in 2013 were positive, and what Turkey wants from EU officials is to approach Turkey without any prejudice, see the positive progress and talk about the shortcomings openly.Hmmmm.......Turkish foreign Minister: Democracy strengthening is priority for Turkey......yeah sure.

Erdogan's 'Just US' party judiciary removes all Prosecutors that ever investigated them.

Erdogan's 'Just US' party judiciary removes all Prosecutors that ever investigated them.(HD).

Turkey’s Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) reassigned the Chief Prosecutor of Istanbul, Turhan Çolakkadı, from his office to a passive position on Jan. 16, as a part of a reshuffle move involving some 20 prosecutors in critical positions.

The move follows a decision by the board on Jan. 15 to change two names in the first department of the board which is in charge of promotions and appointments, as proposed by Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ as the Chair of the HSYK.

Çolakkadı’s name was recently involved in a row with another Istanbul prosecutor, Muammer Akkaş, last month, when Akkaş wanted to open a second wave of a corruption probe right after a major one started on Dec. 17, 2013, but was stopped as the new Istanbul Police Chief Selami Altınok who refused to implement the prosecutor’s orders to carry out the arrests.

Altınok was appointed to the post after the government had removed the former police chief, Hüseyin Çapkın, right after the corruption probe arrests which involved the son of the interior minister of the time.

The probe has led Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to sack four of his ministers whose names were involved in allegations from the Cabinet. Erdoğan considers the probe as an unnamed “coup attempt” against his government by the sympathizers of Fethullah Gülen, a U.S.-resident moderate Islamist scholar who used to be an ally of Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) up until recently.

Bozdağ also gave permission for investigations against three Istanbul prosecutors, Akkaş, Zekeriya Öz and Celal Kara, whose names are involved in the probe operations while blocking an investigation against Çolakkadı, who had opposed Akkaş.

The HSYK decree yesterday also demoted Çolakkadı’s three deputies, Fikret Seçen, Cihan Kansız and Ali Güngör to rather passive positions in and around Istanbul. Hadi Salihoğlu was appointed as the new Chief Prosecutor for Istanbul.Hmmm.......Anyone doubting Erdogan's views on democracy should see this video.

Video - History Flashback 1996 - Turkish Pm Erdogan : "Democracy is like a train. We shall get out when we arrive at the station we want."

Video - Historical Vid 1996 - Turkish Pm Erdogan :"Democracy is like a train. We shall get out when we arrive at the station we want."

In this chilling speech Tayyip Erdogan explains how to manipulate democracy to pave the way towards an Islamic State governed by the laws of Sharia. 

As he explains his vision of the changing future, Erdogan reveals that for him democracy can never be a goal, rather, it can only be considered a useful tool, with which to re-shape a society from one that secular-democratic, to one that is Islamic.

Since then, his political party through various interpretations of "democracy", arrested more than 16,000 thousand secular academics, journalists, scientists, and military officers. More recently his administration proposed certain changes to the Turkish Constitution where words like "democracy" and "secular" be removed. This hair-raising video serves as a perspective on understanding the wave of changes occurring in during his administration.

Deputy chairman of Republican People’s Party (CHP) files criminal complaint against PM Erdoğan.

Deputy chairman of Republican People’s Party (CHP) files criminal complaint against PM Erdoğan.(TZ).

Muharrem İnce, a deputy chairman of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), has filed a criminal complaint against Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for failing to prove the existence of -- or do what is necessary against -- what the prime minister calls “a gang within the state.”

In his complaint, İnce called on Erdoğan to submit evidence to the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office to prove his claims of a shady parallel state that is allegedly working to disrupt the democratic progress of the country by conspiring against the government.

Otherwise, the prime minister should be brought to trial, either over his attempts to influence judicial officials and the judicial processes or for protecting criminals.

“If he avoids these duties, it will be certain that he committed the crime of ‘influencing a person performing official duties’ as defined in the Turkish Criminal Code’s [TCK] Article 277 or ‘slander’ as defined in TCK Article 267,” he said. “Based on these considerations, I kindly request the court to prepare a summary of proceedings about the defendant and send it to the Turkish Parliament,” he added.

Extralegal practices are everywhere, he continued, adding that governmental intervention will likely end the judicial independence eventually.

In his petition, İnce said that “it is quite obvious that a system in which the principle of the separation of powers is almost completely ignored and all power is being accumulated in the hands of the executive is not a state where rule of law prevails.”

One of the main tasks of a prime minister is to take measures to prevent crimes and launch investigations into those who are involved in such actions, the petition said.

At a later press conference İnce held on Wednesday at Parliament in Ankara he said that the government’s main goal is to block an investigation into bribery and corruption that went public with a series of raids on Dec. 17, 2013 from reaching “Number One.”

“They have removed or replaced over 2,000 police officers, and what is this endeavor all about?” he said. The answer, he continued, was that officials were trying to protect the prime minister. Erdoğan now wants “to create a gang within the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK),” he added. “If there is really a gang, Erdoğan is its chief,” İnce added.Hmmm……Erdogan: “Democracy is like a train. We shall get out when we arrive at the station we want.”

Erdogan's 'Islamist Turkey' Tightens the Noose on Freedom of Speech.

Erdogan's 'Islamist Turkey' Tightens the Noose on Freedom of Speech.(HumanrightsTurkey).

It should have surprised no one when another Turkish journalist was fired this past weekend for criticizing the government.  Yeni Safak columnist Murat Aksoy commented on CNN Turk that “the state has collapsed and the government has not been able to handle the crisis well” on January 10.  He was fired the next day.

What is potentially far more damaging to what is left of freedom of speech in Turkey than the silencing of dissident voices in the press is a draft law in the Turkish Parliament to increase surveillance and censorship of the internet.
Hurriyet Daily News, reporting on the Turkish Industry and Business Association’s concerns over the proposed legislation, notes,

• The draft law will permit officials to limit keywords more easily, meaning access to videos on video-sharing websites such as YouTube that include keywords deemed problematic by Turkish authorities will be blocked.

• All individuals’ Internet records, including details about what sites they have visited, which words they have searched for on the web and what activity they have engaged in on social networking websites, will be kept for one or two years, according to the draft law.

• Web providers will also be forced to become members of a new Internet union to be formed under the control of government

Suggestive of the government’s position, Prime Minister has called  twitter “the worst menace to society.” Yet the internet has been one of the few places where Turks have been able to find news outside the highly controlled Turkish media.

As the current political crisis continues, freedom of speech in Turkey seems destined to be one of its chief casualties.Hmmm......Erdogan: “Democracy is like a train. We shall get out when we arrive at the station we want.”

Latest: Erdoğan tells ambassadors it is not upto the EU to comment on controversial bill on judicial council HSYK. “It is not your place” he says

Turkish police now go's to work with packed suitcases, 500 cops removed from posts overnight.

Turkish police now go's to work with packed suitcases, 500 Turkish police removed from posts overnight.(TZ).

Erdogan: "Democracy is like a train. We shall get out when we arrive at the station we want."

A total of 500 police from the National Police Department, including some chiefs and deputy chiefs, were removed from their posts overnight in the latest phase of what appears to be a bureaucratic purge.

The removal and reassignment of police members from their posts is gaining pace following the appointment of new Interior Minister Efkan Ala.

The former interior minister, Muammer Güler, handed in his resignation to the prime minister days after the breaking of a major anti-corruption operation. Güler and two other ministers resigned due to their alleged involvement in corruption and bribery.Ala, who was appointed to the vacant Cabinet position in a reshuffle on Dec. 25, 2013, previously removed three deputy chiefs at the Ankara Police Department, who had only recently been reassigned to those positions.

And last night, 500 more police were removed from their posts in the National Police Department, many of them from its Anti-smuggling and Organized Crime Bureau.Furthermore, six deputy police chiefs were removed from their posts in the Ankara Police Department.The large number of police wanting to learn about their new posts caused the police intranet to freeze due to the heavy traffic. Hmmm.......Turkey now officially a banana republic?
  
Update: The Interior Ministry has sacked and reassigned over 3,000 police officers since an investigation into corruption and bribery became public on Dec. 17, 2013

Related: 

Turkey - IHH raid, former Guantanamo Bay detainee - high ranking Al Qaida operatives detained, AKP removes police chiefs of operation! 

Turkey - IHH raid, former Guantanamo Bay detainee - high ranking Al Qaida operatives detained, AKP removes police chiefs of operation!

Turkey - IHH raid,  former Guantanamo Bay detainee - high ranking Al Qaida operatives detained, AKP removes police chiefs of operation!(LongWarJournal).By LISA LUNDQUISt.

In an apparent crackdown on support for al Qaeda in Syria, Turkish authorities conducted simultaneous raids in seven provinces today against an Islamic relief organization and arrested at least 23 people, including senior al Qaeda operatives. 

The organization, Humanitarian Relief Foundation (İHH), reportedly the biggest Turkish provider of aid to Syria, is protesting its innocence. 

The operation has reportedly netted several senior al Qaeda operatives, including al Qaeda's Middle East deputy leader İbrahim Şen, who is a former Guantanamo Bay detainee, and the terror group's Turkey representative, Halis Bayancuk.

So far the antiterror operation has resulted in the arrest of 19 people in Van, three in Istanbul, and one in Kayseri, as well as the dismissal of Devlet Çıngı, the chief counterterrorism officer in the border city of Kilis, Hurriyet Daily News reported. 

An account in Today's Zaman said numerous al Qaeda operatives were arrested raids in the provinces of İstanbul, Adana, Kilis, Gaziantep, and Kayseri, and that helicopters were deployed in case clashes erupted.

Reuters cited reports by the Turkish news outlet Dogan that police were also conducting raids against al Qaeda suspects in the cities of Gazientep and Adana, near the border with Syria.

IHH General Secretary Yaşar Kutluay protested against the government crackdown, claiming that"[t]hey are trying to show the İHH as if it is related to terror organizations."

Today's raids, which took place during the runup to the Geneva II peace talks on Syria set to begin on Jan. 22, also come amid recent events raising questions about the Erdogan government's position on al Qaeda forces in Syria.

ICT report elaborated further on IHH in commentary regarding trial proceedings on al Qaeda's millenium bomb plot. Testifying in the proceedings, Jean-Louis Bruguiere, the former head of the French judiciary's counterterrorism unit and the head of the US' Terrorist Finance Tracking Program, said that the IHH played important logistical roles in obtaining bogus passports and other counterfeited documents, the trafficking of weapons, the recruitment of jihadists, and their insertion into conflict zones.

The ICT report continued: "[Bruguiere] also stated that the IHH was 'basically helping Al Qaeda when (Usama) bin Laden started to want to target US soil.' 

Importantly, Bruguiere affirmed: 'It's hard to prove, but all elements of the investigation showed that part of the NGO served to hide jihad-type activities ... I'm convinced this was a clear strategy, known by IHH ... it was clearly proven that some of the NGO's work was not charity, it was to provide a facade for moving funds, weapons and mujahedeen to and from Bosnia and Afghanistan.'"

Established in Istanbul in 1992, the IHH is an affiliate of the Union of Good ('I'tilaf al-Khayr), a Saudi-based organization founded in May 2001 that serves as an umbrella group for some 50 Islamic charities. The US designated the Union of Good as a global terrorist organization
in November 2008, stating that it was formed for the purpose of transferring funds to the terrorist group Hamas. The chairman of the Union of Good is Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, an advocate of suicide attacks on Israeli citizens.

Kilis police chief reassigned after raid Amid the controversy, a senior police officer in Kilis was reassigned to another post just hours after the police operation he oversaw earlier in the day. Devlet Çıngı, head of the counterterrorism unit, was reassigned to a post in the juvenile unit.Hmmmm.....Can we now speak of 'State Sponsor of Terrorism'?Read the full story here.More here.

The European Union asks Turkey to be consulted to ensure judicial bill in line with EU legislation.

The European Union asks Turkey to be consulted to ensure judicial bill in line with EU legislation.(HD).

The European Union has made a formal request to Ankara asking to be consulted on the controversial judicial bill on the Parliament’s agenda for ensuring that it is in line with EU legislation.

EU Enlargement Commissioner Stefan Füle said via Twitter that he “asked [Turkish] authorities to consult relevant amendments to laws before adoption to make sure they’re in line with principles of EU legislation.”

The EU had voiced last week strong concerns over the government response to recent graft probes that involve high-profile names and relatives of ruling party members through massive purges in the police and a bill increasing its control on the judiciary.

As a response, Turkey’s freshly-appointed EU minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, who took over from an Egemen Bağış embroiled to the massive probe, urged calm further calling on Brussels to refrain from “unilateral and impatient statements via media.”

The judicial bill is expected to overturn the reform of the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) in line with Turkey’s harmonization with the EU acquis. The body is at the center of the battle over control of the judiciary as its acting head has already condemned the bill as “unconstitutional.”

Füle’s statement was made both in English and Turkish

Turkish professor of political science: "Turkey is having its own Watergate" Absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Turkish professor of political science: "Turkey is having its own Watergate" Absolute power corrupts absolutely.(TZ).

     "This is the basic scientific fact of politics: Absolute power corrupts absolutely."

“We had the Watergate scandal in the United States -- which appeared to be along these lines. There was a big effort by the Republican Party to cover it up at the time. Information about the scandal was leaked in small bits and accumulated over time. It looks somewhat like what is happening in Turkey today,” said Ersin Kalaycıoğlu, an esteemed professor of political science. He also said that the government lost much of its legitimacy and the rule of law is at risk.

“Look at the declaration made by the speaker of the Grand National Assembly, Cemil Çiçek, who is number two in power: Article 138, the article that guarantees the independence of the judiciary, is now dead. That means that there is no independent judicial review,” he said.

When the corruption investigation erupted in mid-December, the prime minister sought to discredit the inquiry by calling it a “foreign plot” and “an attempt to damage the government made by a parallel state nested within the state.”

He immediately ordered the removal of hundreds of police officers who contributed to the probe. The Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) initiated an investigation into four prosecutors involved in the corruption probe and two of the prosecutors were removed from the case. In addition, the government issued a proposal to restructure the HSYK. If adopted, the bill will give the government a tighter grip on the judiciary.

The Watergate scandal was a major political scandal as a result of a break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate office complex in Washington, D.C., and the Nixon administration's attempted cover-up of its involvement. The scandal eventually led to the resignation of the Republican Party's Richard Nixon, the president of the United States, in 1974. The scandal also resulted in the indictment, trial, conviction and incarceration of 43 people, dozens of whom were Nixon's top administration officials.

Nobody yet knows what the results of the investigation in Turkey will be. But Professor Kalaycıoğlu, who specializes in political representation and participation, tells us specifics to Turkey in the scandal, whether or not early elections can be expected, whether or not a popular election can guarantee a democratic government, how the Turkish electorate behaves, where the economy is heading and more.

Were you expecting this development in Turkish politics?

I was expecting an increase in potentially corrupt practices mainly because there was a huge accumulation of power in the executive branch of the government, especially in the Prime Minister's Office, and such an accumulation of power leads to an increase in corruption. This is the basic scientific fact of politics: Absolute power corrupts absolutely. 

Is this true for every country?

Yes, this is true for every country.Read the full interview here.

Erdogan Obama's BFF