The Turkish connection: How Erdoğan’s confidant helped Iran finance terror – POLITICO

Sıtkı Ayan, the businessman helping Tehran sell oil, has so far dodged US sanctions. On March 22 of 2021, several of the world’s most dangerous men descended on Beirut’s historic seaside Summerland Hotel — not to swim in the Mediterranean or explore the sumptuous resort’s “Le Beach Pop Up,” but to talk Turkey. The meeting […]

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Report: Turkey Becoming Major Transit Point for Latin American Cocaine – OCCRP

“Since the 1960s, Turkish traffickers have dominated the global heroin trade, establishing both deep corruption webs at home and a criminal tapestry of port contacts, logistics networks and distribution gangs across Europe,” the report said. “By the 1980s, this had consolidated into the so-called “Balkan Route”: a modern multi-branched Silk Road that transported opiates from Afghanistan and Iran, through the Turkish land mass and into Europe via the Balkans.

A second factor is their connections. After the Balkan route coalesced in the 80s, Turkish organized criminals came into contact with their Latin American equivalents, building a flourishing barter economy of heroin for cocaine.

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The US did not offer Turkey anything to get Erdogan to drop his objections to allowing Sweden and Finland into the alliance, a trio of senior administration officials claim – The Pavlovic Today

A trio of senior administration officials detail the first day of NATO Summit in Madrid. Here’s what they told The Pavlovic Today. The new NATO strategic concept will be released shortly and focuses heavily on Russia. But it also, for the first time, mentions China. The document will note that China’s stated ambitions and challenge

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EXPLAINER: How was Turkey’s veto of Nordic NATO bid avoided? – San Francisco Chronicle

Before the text was released, Turkish officials circulated to media outlets a note titled “Turkey got what it wanted.” Finland’s leading newspaper, Helsingin Sanomat, wrote in an editorial that “Turkey got what it wanted – and so did Finland and Sweden.”

“The memorandum was the price that had to be paid for the weird style of dealings with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that at the same time represents typical behavior to Turkey,” the Finnish newspaper said.

While arguing against making Sweden and Finland NATO members, Erdogan showed videos and photographs of PKK demonstrations in Sweden as evidence of his claim of Swedish indifference to terrorism.

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Turkey: Cocaine Hub Between Europe and the Middle East – Insight Crime

In 2022, cocaine shipments heading to Turkey have been seized in Ecuador, West Africa, and Malta, as well as in Turkey itself.

Though the vast majority of this cocaine simply transits through Turkey, a growing minority now stays in the country, according to a 2019 EMCDDA report. The country’s domestic market saw a record expansion between 2007 and 2017, with drug seizures increasing tenfold during this time.

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Turkey signed secret agreements with countries to abduct dissidents from abroad: UN | Al Arabiya English

Turkey signed secret agreements with multiple countries in order to conduct extraterritorial abductions of suspected state dissidents, according to a joint letter penned by four UN rapporteurs. The letter, dated early May, notes allegations of secret agreements signed with Azerbaijan, Albania, Cambodia, and Gabon – all countries that the UN has received reports of human

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Erdogan’s Security Clash w/Protesters & Journalists – Washington D.C. – USA

Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s security detail assaulted reporters and protesters outside a venue in Washington, D.C., at which the Turkish president was speaking.

Amnesty International held a demonstration in front of the Brookings Institute building, where President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan will deliver a speech today. In the demonstration before the speech, Turkey’s military operations in the east and southeast were protested.

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