Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, emboldened by local election wins, on Friday criticized Twitter, the nation’s top court, central bank and hinted he could run for the presidency.
Asked whether he would seek to become head of state in August, the first time voters will directly elect the president, Erdogan said he and Turkish President Abdullah Gul “will reach a decision after negotiating this between us.”
After Erdogan’s 11 years in power, months of crisis and bitterly contested mayoral elections on Sunday last week, Turkey has been left even more polarized between a secular and mostly urban middle-class and Erdogan’s loyal base in the conservative Muslim working class.
Erdogan, head of a hugely popular Islamic-rooted party, spoke bluntly on Friday on a flashpoint issue in the crisis: an official block on Twitter that was overturned this week as breaching free speech by the highest court.
“I don’t respect this ruling,” a defiant Erdogan said, a day after Twitter went live again in Turkey. “All our national, moral values have been put aside,” he said about the social media service, which has hosted a torrent of recordings implicating Erdogan’s inner circle in sleaze and corruption. “Insults to a country’s prime minister and ministers are all around.”
Echoing Erdogan, Turkish Minister of Justice Bekir Bozdag said: “Unfortunately, the Constitutional Court exceeded its limits.”
However, Washington hailed the court’s decision as supporting freedom of expression.
“We also note that the Turkish government implemented the ruling yesterday to unblock Twitter,” US State Department deputy spokesperson Marie Harf said. “Obviously, we continue to urge the government to open all social media space in Turkey.”
The US also praised a ruling by a lower court in Ankara on Friday against Turkey’s ban on YouTube.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing