Turkey will launch its first 24-hour television channel broadcasting in the once-banned Kurdish language next week in an apparent attempt to cut support for Kurdish rebels fighting for autonomy in the country’s southeast.
Analysts say the state-run news channel is aimed at taking viewers from the Kurdish Roj TV, a satellite station based in Belgium that is popular with many of the country’s estimated 14 million Kurds but has angered Turkey for broadcasting statements by rebel commanders.
The Kurdistan Workers’ Party, considered a terrorist organization by the US and the EU, has been fighting for autonomy in southeast Turkey since 1984.
The state-run channel, which launches on Jan. 1, marks a change of policy in a country where speaking Kurdish was banned until 1991.
Under pressure from the EU to strengthen the rights of minority Kurds, state television began broadcasting documentaries and news in Kurdish in 2004 but for only about 30 minutes each week.
Turkey is seeking to weaken the rebels who have criticized the government for a lack of broadcasts in the Kurdish language, said Nihat Ali Ozcan, an analyst based at the Economic Policy Research Institute in Ankara and an expert on the rebels.
“Turkey is changing its policy on Kurdish language broadcasts to cut support to the rebels and create an alternative to the Roj TV,” Ozcan said. “At the same time, Turkey is meeting Kurdish demands for more cultural rights under pressure from the European Union.”
Several stations based in Iraq and Iran already broadcast in Kurdish and can be seen in Turkey, Kurdish leaders say.
However in Turkey, only state-run television will be allowed to broadcast around-the-clock in Kurdish, the language of a minority that makes up about 20 percent of Turkey’s population of more than 70 million.
A Zurich city councilor has apologized and reportedly sought police protection against threats after she fired a sport pistol at an auction poster of a 14th-century Madonna and child painting, and posted images of their bullet-ridden faces on social media. Green-Liberal party official Sanija Ameti, 32, put the images on Instagram over the weekend before quickly pulling them down. She later wrote on social media that she had been practicing shots from about 10m and only found the poster as “big enough” for a suitable target. “I apologize to the people who were hurt by my post. I deleted it immediately when I
The governor of Ohio is to send law enforcement and millions of dollars in healthcare resources to the city of Springfield as it faces a surge in temporary Haitian migrants. Ohio Governor Mike DeWine on Tuesday said that he does not oppose the Temporary Protected Status program under which about 15,000 Haitians have arrived in the city of about 59,000 people since 2020, but said the federal government must do more to help affected communities. On Monday, Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost directed his office to research legal avenues — including filing a lawsuit — to stop the federal government from sending
At first, Francis Ari Sture thought a human was trying to shove him down the steep Norwegian mountainside. Then he saw the golden eagle land. “We are staring at each other for, maybe, a whole minute,” Sture said on Monday. “I’m trying to think what’s in its mind.” The bird then attacked Sture five more times on Thursday last week, scratching and clawing the 31-year-old bicycle courier’s face and arms over 10 to 15 minutes as he sprinted down the mountain. The same eagle is believed to be responsible for attacks on three other people across a vast mountainous area of southern Norway
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