In a letter released today to President Obama, Foreign Policy Initiative, the Project on Middle East Democracy, Freedom House, and Reporters Without Borders expressed their concern over apparent stalled progress and regression in \u201ccrucial areas.\u201d The letter draws attention to the deteriorating situation for journalists and members of the press in Turkey, as well as concerns over Kurdish rights, freedom of expression, and the position of women in the government and labor force.<\/p>\n
\u201cHundreds of military officers, as well as various scholars and journalists, have been arrested and charged through trials dogged by allegations of fabricated evidence used by the prosecution,\u201d the letter says. \u201cTurkey, once a leader in the region on the role of women in society, has alarmingly few women in high level government positions and professions, and has seen a steady decline in women\u2019s participation in the labor force,\u201d it adds.<\/p>\n
The organizations urge President Obama \u201cto express publicly and privately America\u2019s concerns about Turkey\u2019s backsliding, and to direct diplomatic efforts toward ensuring that Turkey resumes a course designed to consolidate democracy and the rule of law.\u201d Given the tenuous situation in the region due primarily to events in Syria, the U.S.-Turkey relationship \u201cneeds to be based on our shared values, not just shared strategic interests,\u201d and \u201crule of law and political freedoms [must be] a priority in your engagements with Prime Minister Erdogan.\u201d<\/p>\n
via NGO Letter to Obama: Concern over Turkey\u2019s Actions | Project on Middle East Democracy (POMED).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In a letter released today to President Obama, Foreign Policy Initiative, the Project on Middle East Democracy, Freedom House, and Reporters Without Borders expressed their concern over apparent stalled progress and regression in \u201ccrucial areas.\u201d The letter draws attention to the deteriorating situation for journalists and members of the press in Turkey, as well as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":32532,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2938],"tags":[200,57],"class_list":["post-62675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle-east-middle-east-regions","tag-democracy","tag-human-rights-turkey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32532"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}