Journalist Elke Dangeleit criticised the fact that Turkey’s military operations against northern Syria and Iraq were not covered in the western media while Russia’s aggression towards Ukraine was widely covered in her article published on the Telepolis website on 27 December.
“Looking at the end of 2022, it can be seen that the Turkish government continues to contribute significantly to the destabilization of the Middle East,” said Dangeleit. “President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan continues to progress towards transforming the Turkish state into an Islamist, authoritarian regime. The eradication of remnants of the rule of law and the fueling of nationalism is gaining momentum with the upcoming elections in 2023.”
The journalist emphasised that Kurds have been discriminated against as ethnic minorities for years, and argued that “anti-Kurdish racism is more or less supported by the state” in Turkey.
Stressing Turkey’s crackdown on religious and ethnic minorities in 2022, Dangeleit wrote that the Turkish government was moving towards eliminating the democratic opposition in the country by all means.
“In October, the head of the Turkish Medical Association’s (TTB), Şebnem Korur Fincancı, was arrested. Her crime: she called for an independent investigation into allegations that the Turkish military was using chemical weapons in Iraq. The mere demand for an independent investigation, which could theoretically also lead to Turkey being exonerated from the allegations, is now a punishable offence,” Dangeleit wrote.
