seizure

Government seizes businesses in Turkey

The Turkish government has seized hundreds of businesses. Many of the owners have fled to Germany. The government accused these owners of supporting the Gülen movement. The government says Gülen was behind the recent coup attempt.

Source: https://www.dw.com/en/government-seizes-businesses-in-turkey/av-37084560 

 


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SEND A LETTER: CONFISCATED BUSINESSES

PROPERTY RIGHTS UNDER THREAT IN TURKEY

Property rights in Turkey are unfortunately no longer protected. Since 2015 and mainly after the failed coup attempt in 2016, the Erdogan government is showing disregard to the rights of its dissidents. The followers of the Gulen Movement, specifically the businesspeople who supported the movement and many opponents of the Erdogan government have become the victim of this merciless purge.

The Erdogan government published the number of confiscated businesses. Muhiddin Gülal, the head of Savings Deposits Insurance Fund (TMSF), a government organization that operates the confiscated companies, told in July 2018 that, at the time, 937 companies had been managed by trustees, reaching TL 19.4 billion (USD 3.3 billion) in equity and TL 50 billion (USD 8.5 billion) in assets. The numbers Gülal mentioned do not even include the assets of 127 individuals, 19 unions, 15 private universities, 49 hospitals, 174 media outlets, 1,419 foundations, and another 2,271 education companies confiscated by the government. The total value of all assets confiscated is estimated to be about TL 100 billion (USD 17 billion). Moreover, if we calculate this amount per the exchange rates of the confiscation date, the total number will be close to USD 40 billion.

Confiscated businesses illustrates the violation of the fundamental human right of private property in Turkey. There is no longer liberal economic politics in Turkey, rather they are despotic and coercive in nature, and no government opponent is economically safe. We want the Turkish government to change its seizure policies and reinstitute the property rights all over the country and follow the Rule of Law.

You can download the sample letter and implement your own story of confiscated businesses or seized properties

https://silencedturkey.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Letter-sample-for-businessman-confiscated-property.docx

TRANSLATION & LAWYER

AST volunteers will help you in your local area to translate your story to English. If you could not find anyone to translate your story send your story to [email protected]. we will translate and send it back to you to be signed and send to relevant contacts. If you want to get legal advice pls send an email to [email protected] to be contacted with a legal consultant till January 1st.

SEND AN EMAIL OR MAIL

We urge the victims of confiscated businesses or seized properties to take action. Express your views or send attached statement to following addresses:

United Nations Human Rights Office of the High Commissioner

The Honorable Ms. Michelle Bachelet Jeria/High Commissioner
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]

Special Rapporteur on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms while countering terrorism

Ms. Fionnuala D.Ni Aolain

[email protected]
[email protected]

The European Parliament Human Rights Committee

Per Antonio Panzeri/Chair
Barbara Lochbihler/Vice-Chair
Francisco Assis/Member
Amjad Bashir/Member
Klaus Buchner/Member
Wajid Khan/member
Kati Piri/Substitute
Judith Sargentini/Substitute

[email protected]

The European Parliament Committee on Foreign Affairs

David McAllister/Chair
Javier Couso Permuy/Vice-Chair
Nikos Androulakis/Member
Michele Alliot Marie/Member
Petras Austrevicius/Member
Johannes Cornelis van Baalen/Member
Mario Borghezio/Member
Aymeric Chauprade/Member

[email protected]

The European Parliament Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs

Roberto Gualtieri/Chair
Peter Simon/Vice-Chair
Kay Swinburne, Vice-Chair
Hugues Bayet/Member
David Coburn/Member
Thierry Cornillet/Member
Jonas Fernandez/Member
Sven Giegold/Member

[email protected]

The European Parliament Committee on Industry, Research and Energy

Jerzy Buzek/Chair
Patrizia Toia/Vice-Chair
Jaromir Kohlicek/Vice-Chair
Morten Helveg Petersen/Vice-Chair
Bendt Bendtsen/Member
Xabier Benito Ziluaga/member
Jakob Dalunde/Member
Adam Gierek/Member

[email protected]

European Court of Human Rights Judges of the Court

Guido Raimond
Angelika Nußberger
Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos
Ganna Yudkivska
Robert Spano

EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL OF EUROPE
67075 STRASBOURG CEDEX FRANCE
Tel: + 33 (0)3 88 41 20 18
Fax: + 33 (0)3 88 41 27 30

Parliamentary Assembly Council of Europe

Türki̇ye konusunda çali̇şan raportör üyeler:

– Ingebjørg Godskesen (Norway, CE) @IngAmGod
– Marianne Mikko (Estonia, SOC) @mariannemikko

Co-rapporteurs of the the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) for the monitoring of Turkey:

– Marianne Mikko (Estonia, SOC) @mariannemikko
– Nigel Evans (United Kingdom, EC) @nigelmp
– Bernd Fabritius (Germany, EPP/ CD) @BerndFabritius (rapporteur on ‘new threats to the rule of law in Council of Europe member States – selected examples’
– Raphael Comte (Switzerland, ALDE) @RaphaelComteCE (rapporteur on ‘state of emergency: proportionality issues concerning derogations under Article 15 of the European Convention on Human Rights’)

Head of the Secretariat/ Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly

Schirmer Guenter
[email protected]

KATI PIRI

[email protected]

President of German Bar Association

Raun Ulrich Schellenberg (advocated against ECtHR’s decision)
Kurfürstendamm 182 10707 Berlin

​Correspondence to:

​German Lawyers Association
Littenstraße 11, 10179 Berlin
Phone : +49 (30) 726152-140
Fax : +49 (30) 726152-192
[email protected]

International Monetary Fund

Srikant Seshadri / Resident representative for Turkey
Email: [email protected]
Tel: +903 12 446 5007
Fax: +903 12 446 5266

World Bank

Johannes Zutt / Country Director for Turkey, Europe and Central Asia
Tel : +(880-2) 8159001
[email protected]

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH

https://www.hrw.org/contact-us

HUMAN RIGHTS FOUNDATION

Thor Halvorssen/President
[email protected]
[email protected]

Our Team

Human Rights Without Frontiers
[email protected]
Human Rights and Democracy Network
[email protected]
European Association for the Defense of Human Rights
[email protected]
Platform of European Social NGO’s
[email protected]
European Citizen Action Service (ECAS)
[email protected]
OSCE-Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights
[email protected]

European Commission

[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]
[email protected]

Credit rating Agencies

MOODY’S
[email protected]

STANDART & POOR’S
[email protected]

FITCH RATINGS
[email protected]
[email protected]

Mixed

The Honorable Thorbjørn Jagland
Secretary General of the Council of Europe Council of Europe
​Avenue de l’Europe F-67075
​Strasbourg Cedex, France
Email: [email protected]

The Honorable Nils Muižnieks
Commissioner for Human Rights Council of Europe
​Avenue de l’Europe F-67075 Strasbourg Cedex, France
twitter:@CommissionerHR

Honorable Christos Giakoumopoulos
Directorate General Human Rights and Rule of Law Council of Europe
Avenue de l’Europe F-67075 ​Strasbourg Cedex, France
Email: [email protected]

Martin Schulz
President of European Parliament
twitter:EP_President
EP contact: https://www.secure.europarl.europa.eu/atyourservice/en/askEP.html
Address:European Parliament Bât. Altiero Spinelli ​60 rue Wiertz / Wiertzstraat 60 B-1047 – Bruxelles/Brussels Belgium Phone: +32(0)2 28 42111
Fax: +32(0)2 28 46974

Donald Tusk
President of the European Council
twitter:@eucopresident
Send e-mail to President: http://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/

Jean-Claude Juncker
President of the EU Commission
twitter:@junckerEU
e-mail to EC: http://europa.eu/contact/write-to-us/index_en.htm

Frederica Mogherini
High Representative of the EU for foreign affairs and Security Policy-Vice President of the EU Commission
twitter:@FedericaMog

NEWS & ARTICLES

Assets worth $11bn seized in Turkey crackdown
https://www.ft.com/content/fed595d0-631e-11e7-8814-0ac7eb84e5f1

Turkish Businesses Snagged In Government’s Post-Coup Crackdown
https://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2017/08/03/541360939/turkish-businesses-snagged-in-governments-post-coup-crackdown

Turkish business suffers under Erdogan’s post-coup Gulen purge
https://www.cnbc.com/2016/11/07/turkish-business-suffers-under-erdogans-post-coup-gulen-pur
ge.html

Turkey seized 879 companies since failed coup, worth 40.3 bln lira -state fund
https://www.reuters.com/article/turkey-security-companies-idUSI7N1II00J

Turkey Sees Foes at Work in Gold Mines, Cafes and ‘Smurf Village’
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/22/business/turkey-akin-ipek-fethullah-gulen-recep-tayyip-erd
ogan.html

http://www.spiegel.de/international/business/turkish-economy-heading-toward-crisis-under-erdo
gan-a-1141363.html

Turkey Corruption Report
https://www.business-anti-corruption.com/country-profiles/turkey/

https://www.economist.com/europe/2017/02/02/turkeys-purges-are-hitting-its-business-class
/

Turkey confiscates some 50 religious properties from Christian minority
https://www.foxnews.com/us/turkey-confiscates-some-50-religious-properties-from-christian-min
ority

REPORT

For more information click the 36 pages detailed report about some confiscated businesses in Turkey.

“A predatory approach to individual rights: Erdogan’s government unlawful seizures of private properties and confiscated businesses companies in Turkey”

https://silencedturkey.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/A-PREDATORY-APPROACH-TO-INDIVIDUAL-RIGHTS_-ERDOGAN-GOVERNMENT’S-UNLAWFUL-SEIZURES-OF-PRIVATE-PROPERTIES-AND-COMPANIES-IN-TURKEY.pdf

VIDEO

Government seizes businesses in Turkey

https://www.dw.com/en/government-seizes-businesses-in-turkey/av-37084560

 


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After Yearlong Struggle, Turkey’s Crackdown Reaches Afghan Schools

Turkey’s global purge and the crackdown on Gulen-affiliated schools never show signs of abating. The latest attempt took place in Afghanistan on Sunday, with all the hallmarks of previous ones already displayed in various times in Turkey or other countries.

Early on Sunday, officials linked with Turkey’s state-run Maarif Foundation took control of two schools in Herat province of Afghanistan. In a submission to unyielding demands from Ankara, the Afghan Education Ministry already relinquished the control of a number of private Afghan-Turkish schools affiliated with the Gulen Movement to Ankara-backed Maarif Foundation earlier this year.

The decision set off a yearlong showdown between new officials and the families of students who were adamantly opposed to any takeover of the schools by Ankara.

Previous attempts to run schools hit a snag after families’ unflinching and stubborn resistance. But this Sunday, Maarif-linked officials came to the school, touching off a new episode of clashes between families and the Afghan authorities.

While Turkey’s efforts to seize Gulen-affiliated schools across the world mostly took place without much fuss, things in Afghanistan developed differently as families vowed to fight against the seizure as long as possible within their capacity.

The Sunday takeover resulted in a number of brief detentions, local media reported. Police and security forces laid a siege to all-girls and all-boys schools in Herat. A Turkish official working for
Afghan-Turkish school network divulged details of how the events transpired in schools with media.

Police blocked access to schools, assembled students to a gathering point and seized their cellphones to restrict diffusion of the news throughout media. They detained some teachers and students who attempted to resist those attempts.

When news of the crackdown filtered through social media and the local community, parents of students began to amass outside schools. The committee of student families was summoned by the provincial education bureau of the Afghan government in Herat for consultations and briefing. An official who talked to AST on the condition of anonymity claimed that the summoning served as a distraction as Afghan authorities descended on one of the schools’ principal office at the same time to finalize the management change.

They even held a symbolic ceremony for the commencement of new administrators. When police and security forces left the school, graduates, students and a group of families forced the newly installed Maarif officials out of the school after a brief scuffle.

Maarif directors took refuge in armed vehicles of Afghan security forces outside one of the schools. A melee followed thereafter as graduated schools displayed their fury against the takeover of the school.

This invited a large force of reinforcements as top education official in Herat sought new forces to break up the protest and suppress the resistance by families. The deployment of additional police forces within school sparked some clashes. The police forcefully detained many students.

As things escalated into some violent showdown, more than 400 people assembled outside the school to demand the release of detained students.

So far now, no Turkish teachers were taken into custody, something that always occurred in other countries where such school takeovers took place.

In first official remarks on the incident, Herat Governor’s Spokesman Jelani Farhad confirmed that security forces carried out a court order against Gulen-linked schools. He also acknowledged that the raid was conducted to change the school director.

But the official denied any wrongdoing and insisted that the whole takeover took place as part of an official agreement between the governments Afghanistan and Turkey.

Afghan-Turk Cag Educational (ATCE), an NGO that previously ran the schools, condemned the police raid, portraying it as a move incompatible with civil law, constitution, the criminal code of the country, not to speak of international norms.

Turkey’s yearlong efforts were repeatedly foiled by a group of determinant families. The attitude displayed by student parents and NGOs defending education rights of the Afghan people offer some form of a solace in a country where civil society barely exists. In a repudiation of the perception that civil society is just a letter on paper, devoid of any substance, in Afghanistan, the families pledged to prolong their fight against Maarif’s brazen takeover.

A large-scale demonstration is expected to take place on Monday. Afghanistan, which goes through a decades-long war between Western-backed government forces and a resurgent Taliban, suffers a shortage of teachers and education facilities. In the face of depleted sources and tremendous hardships, the last thing Kabul needs is to alienate a group of volunteers and NGOs which, for their unswerving commitment to Afghan people, did not leave the country even in the face of a protracted and deadly war. Kabul should return the favor by ignoring Turkey’s norm-defying demand for the takeover of the schools, which have become beacons of success and advanced education.

We urge everyone to take action. Express your views or send attached letter or your own letter to following addresses:

You can find a sample letter at the following link.

https://silencedturkey.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/Letter_to_officials_erdogans_long_arm_in_afghanistan.pdf

You can find your U.S Senator at the following link.

https://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

You can find your U.S Representatives at the link.

https://www.house.gov/representatives

1) Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, U.S. Helsinki Commission
Phone: 202-225-1901
Fax: 202-226-4199
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @HelsinkiComm
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/helsinkicommission/

Chairman: Senator Roger F. Wicker
Address and Contact:
555 Dirksen 555 Senate Office Building, Washington, DC 20510
Main: (202) 224-6253 |Fax: (202) 228-0378 | Twitter: @SenatorWicker
Email: [email protected]

Co-Chairman: Representative Christopher H. Smith
Washington DC Office: 2373 Rayburn House Office Building Washington, D.C. 20515
Phone: (202) 225-3765 | Fax: (202) 225-7768 | Twitter: @RepChrisSmith
https://chrissmith.house.gov/contact/zipauth.htm

2) Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission
Phone: +1 (202) 225-3599
Fax: +1 (202) 226-5887
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @TLHumanRights

3) Congressional Afghan Caucus
Phone: +1 (202) 225-2411
Fax: +1 (202) 225-2013
Federal Caucus Member: Pete King, [email protected],
Federal Caucus Member: Bill Pascrell, [email protected]

4) United Nations Human Rights Council (UN HRC)
Phone: (+41) 22 917 9656
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @UN_HRC
Website: www.ohchr.org/hrc

5) U.S. Department of State
Phone: (202) 647-6575
Email: https://register.state.gov/contactus/contactusform
Twitter: @StateDept
Website: https://www.state.gov/

6) Mike Pence, Vice President of the United States
Phone: 202-456-6213
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @VP

7) Senator Cory Booker
Phone: (202) 224-3224
Fax: (202) 224-8378
Email: https://www.booker.senate.gov/?p=contact
Twitter:@SenBooker

AFGHANISTAN

1) President Ashraf Ghani
Twitter: @ashrafghani
Phone: 0202104444,
0202104445
Hamdullah Mohib, National Security Advisor (Former Afghanistan’s Ambassador to the United
States)
Twitter: @hmohib

2) Shah Hussain Murtazawi,
Acting Spokesperson for President’s Office
Phone: +93 (0) 728 998 907
Email: [email protected]

3) Salahuddin Rabbani. Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan
Address: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Afghanistan,
Malek Asghar St. Kabul, Afghanistan
Phone: 0093 (0) 20 2100372,
0093 (0) 20 2100371
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @mfa_afghanistan http://mfa.gov.af/en/form/contactus

4) Hamdullah Mohib, Afghanistan’s Ambassador to the United States
Address: Embassy of Afghanistan, 2341 Wyoming Ave., NW, Washington, DC 20008 Phone:
202-483-6410
Fax: 202-483-6488
[email protected]

Contact Us

5) Mahmoud SAIKAL, Ambassador and Permanent Representative Permanent Mission of
The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan in New York Address: 633 Third Avenue Floor 27A, New York,
NY 10017
Phone: 212-972 1212
Fax: 212-972 1216
@AfghanMissionUN
[email protected]

6) U.S. Embassy Kabul
Phone: (00 93) (0)700-10-8000
Fax: (00 93) (0)700-108-564 @USEmbassyKabul
[email protected]

7) DR. ABDULLAH ABDULLAH(CEO)
Special Assistant Ahmet Zahit Anwari
0093700291626
0093202106803
[email protected]
[email protected]

8) Chief of Staff Abdul Kahar Abed
0093744200000
0093700281980
[email protected]

9) Spoke person
Dr. Mucibur Rahman Rahimi
PH: 0093702103333
[email protected]

10) Ministry of Foreign Affairs

0093202100372
0093202100371
[email protected]

Social media posts on the raid:

HASHTAG
#DoNotPoliticizeAfghanSchools

 


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