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| The Grand Turk |
| Turkey vows to hunt down 'dark forces' behind Istanbul hostage-taking |
| 2015-04-02 |
| [Hurriyet Daily News] The Turkish government vowed to fight against terrorism on April 1, a day after an Istanbul prosecutor and two hostage takers were killed in an operation in Istanbul's Caglayan courthouse after a six-hour crisis. Safak Yayla and Bahtiyar Dogruyol of the outlawed far-left Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP/C) took prosecutor Mehmet Selim Kiraz, 46, hostage in his office in Istanbul on March 31. All three were killed in a shootout with police that began at around 8:30 p.m. Kiraz was laid to rest on April 1 after a ceremony in the courthouse where he was taken hostage, followed by funeral prayers in Istanbul's Eyup district. "We don't see this as an attack on our deceased prosecutor, but on the whole justice system. It is a gun directed at our nation," Justice Minister Kenan Ipek told mourners at a ceremony attended by hundreds of lawyers and judges. "Our state is powerful enough to track down those behind these lowlifes. The fact that these assassins are dead shouldn't put those nefarious and dark forces at ease," he said, as Kiraz's coffin, draped with the Turkish flag, stood on display in the courthouse foyer. Many of Kiraz's colleagues across ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... released statements or held protests condemning the attack. Funeral prayers were held in many cities across Turkey for the slain prosecutor. The Caglayan Courthouse where the attack took place will be renamed the Mehmet Selim Kiraz Courthouse in memory of the prosecutor, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu announced in a presser on April 1 in Ankara. Davutoglu also praised the coppers who conducted the operation during the hostage crisis, saying they had applied the instructions they had been given. Davutoglu said the police were told to rescue the prosecutor alive from the attack but also to use every measure if they feared for his life. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #1 Racists! |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2015-04-02 04:53 |