ISTANBUL: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday warned that a Turkish newspaper would pay a “price” after a contentious report over alleged tensions between his government and the army.
Istanbul prosecutors launched an investigation into the Hurriyet front page story on Saturday which suggested that the army was not satisfied with the recent actions by the government.
The story listed seven grievances including the lifting of a historic ban on female officers wearing the Islamic headscarf in the officially secular country.
“Let me put it very clearly, what’s done here, the headline they have used is insolent,” Erdogan told reporters at an Istanbul airport before leaving for Pakistan on an official visit.
Erdogan said nobody had the right to set the army against the government and warned: “Whoever tries to set us against one another will pay a price.”
“No offense but I don’t find such an approach forgivable at a time when we need unity, fraternity and solidarity more than ever,” he added.
Erdogan said he discussed the issue with Chief of Staff General Hulusi Akar on Monday.
The government increased control over the armed forces in the wake of an attempted coup in July last year blamed on followers of preacher Fethullah Gulen.
The Hurriyet newspaper, the flagship daily of Dogan Media Group — the Turkish media giant which owns television channels Kanal D and CNN-Turk — is a mainstream daily but houses pro-government columnists as well.
The story headlined “the army headquarters are uneasy,” based on military sources, carried the byline of Hurriyet’s Ankara bureau chief Hande Firat.
Firat, one of Turkey’s most prominent journalists, was fiercely condemned by pro-government media for “coup mongering.”
Ironically, Firat played a crucial role in defeating the July 15 coup when she spoke to Erdogan live on her CNN-Turk show by FaceTime on the night of the putsch.
Erdogan used the interview to rally his supporters, calling them into the streets to resist the attempted power-grab.
An Istanbul prosecutor’s office on Monday launched an investigation into whether there was a pro-coup faction within the military that was trying to block the government’s actions, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
The army on Tuesday dismissed “baseless and intentional criticism” in the Hurriyet story, which it said was a “distortion” aimed at harming the armed forces at a time when it is fighting terror at home and in Syria.
Appearing on CNN-Turk, Firat said the critics had not read her story properly, adding that Hurriyet had sought comment from the military chief of staff.
“We, as Hurriyet newspaper and Dogan Group, will continue to defend democracy,” she said.
Erdogan defended the lifting of the headscarf ban in the army and said women would enjoy their freedom.
“In the following process our victimized, oppressed sisters will take their place in all institutions” from the judiciary to the education sector, he said.
Erdogan says paper to pay ‘price’ over controversial report
Erdogan says paper to pay ‘price’ over controversial report
The UN says Al-Hol camp population has dropped sharply as Syria moves to relocate remaining families
The UN says Al-Hol camp population has dropped sharply as Syria moves to relocate remaining families
- Forces of Syria’s central government captured the Al-Hol camp on Jan. 21 during a weekslong offensive against the SDF, which had been running the camp near the border with Iraq for a decade
DAMASCUS: The UN refugee agency said Sunday that a large number of residents of a camp housing family members of suspected Daesh group militants have left and the Syrian government plans to relocate those who remain.
Gonzalo Vargas Llosa, UNHCR’s representative in Syria, said in a statement that the agency “has observed a significant decrease in the number of residents in Al-Hol camp in recent weeks.”
“Syrian authorities have informed UNHCR of their plan to relocate the remaining families to Akhtarin camp in Aleppo Governorate (province) and have requested UNHCR’s support to assist the population in the new camp, which we stand ready to provide,” he said.
He added that UNHCR “will continue to support the return and reintegration of Syrians who have departed Al-Hol, as well as those who remain.”
The statement did not say how residents had left the camp or how many remain. Many families are believed to have escaped either during the chaos when government forces captured the camp from the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces last month or afterward.
There was no immediate statement from the Syrian government and a government spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.
At its peak after the defeat of IS in Syria in 2019, around 73,000 people were living at Al-Hol. Since then, the number has declined with some countries repatriating their citizens. The camp’s residents are mostly children and women, including many wives or widows of IS members.
The camp’s residents are not technically prisoners and most have not been accused of crimes, but they have been held in de facto detention at the heavily guarded facility.
Forces of Syria’s central government captured the Al-Hol camp on Jan. 21 during a weekslong offensive against the SDF, which had been running the camp near the border with Iraq for a decade. A ceasefire deal has since ended the fighting.
Separately, thousands of accused IS militants who were held in detention centers in northeastern Syria have been transferred to Iraq to stand trial under an agreement with the US
The US military said Friday that it had completed the transfer of more than 5,700 adult male IS suspects from detention facilities in Syria to Iraqi custody.
Iraq’s National Center for International Judicial Cooperation said a total of 5,704 suspects from 61 countries who were affiliated with IS — most of them Syrian and Iraqi — were transferred from prisons in Syria. They are now being interrogated in Iraq.
