Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci and his wife Meral Akinci will receive well-wishers at their residence tomorrow morning.

Meanwhile, the "police and municipalities" are also taking precautionary measures so that "citizens" can celebrate the holiday comfortably.

[B] Turkish Press

[01] Erdogan vows to lift state of emergency if re-elected

"If I continue working [as the President], the first thing to do after June 24 would be, God willing, is lifting the state of emergency," Erdogan said during an interview on private broadcaster 24 TV-360 late on June 13.

(…)Erdogan had said last year that the state of emergency "will not be removed until peace is restored."

He also claimed on June 13 that the state of emergency has not affected the election campaigns of his opponents. "There is not a single effect of state of emergency on election campaigns. If there is one, they should give me one single example," he said.

Erdogan added that lifting the state of emergency "would not mean completely abolishing it with no return." "When we see terrorism, we take the strictest measures to stop it. Did France completely abolish its state of emergency?" he said.

Erdogan also praised the role of the recently opened Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP), a natural gas pipeline that stretches from the Turkish-Georgian border to the Turkish-Greek border and supplies natural gas to Turkey and also European countries.

The 1,850-kilometer pipeline is the largest section of the 3,500-km Southern Gas Corridor, which was inaugurated on May 29 in Baku.

Erdogan further referred to the Turkish Stream natural gas pipeline, which will carry gas from Russia under the Black Sea to Turkish Thrace. The project agreement between Ankara and Moscow for the Turkish Stream pipeline was signed on Oct. 10, 2016 and was ratified by Russian President Vladimir Putin on Feb. 7.

One of the pipelines, with a capacity of 15.75 billion cubic meters, is expected to supply the Turkish market, while a second pipeline will carry gas to Europe. "All of these are making Turkey a [gas] hub. We are distributing it to Europe from here," Erdogan said, adding that natural gas will no longer be an issue for Turkey as it would have the authority to increase or decrease the amount of gas flow.

[02] Erdogan slams jailed HDP presidential candidate Demirtas and asks for his candidacy nomination to be removed

"[The opposition says Demirtas] should be released because he is a presidential candidate. What does that mean? There should be some criteria for being a presidential candidate ... It should be corrected, God willing," Erdogan said at a campaign rally in the northern province of Trabzon on June 13.

He suggested that the HDP candidate is being tried for "serious crimes that necessitate the dismissal of his nomination."

Demirtas has been in prison since November 2016 in a case in which he is being tried for "leading a terrorist organization." As his trial is still ongoing and there is no conviction against him yet, the Supreme Board of Elections (YSK) has approved his candidacy and opposition parties have supported his release for the campaign period.

Erdogan criticized the YSK's ruling, saying "it has been argued that he is not convicted, he is only imprisoned. But the reason for imprisonment is very important."

Erdogan accuses the former HDP co-leader of inciting deadly street protests in October 2014, arguing that "he called on Kurdish people to hit the streets after the June 7 election [in 2015] and 53 of our people then died."

Demirtas had responded Erdogan's accusations on June 11, saying the street protests long pre-dated the June 7, 2015 elections as they took place on Oct. 7, 2014 and there has been no criminal case filed against either him or any HDP officials regarding the incidents.

"There isn't a single case filed against either me or HDP officials for the Kobane incidents. All of our [HDP deputies] demanded an official parliamentary investigation into the instigators behind the Kobane protests but this request was denied by AKP lawmakers," he added in a statement issued via Twitter.

"The number of people who died in the protests is 43, not 53," Demirtas said, noting that no investigation has been initiated over any of the deaths apart from those of the six members of the religious Kurdish party Huda-Par.

[03] Istanbul court orders K?l?cdaroglu to pay 142,000 liras in 'offshore case' involving Erdogan

The complaint filed by Erdogan was the second in a row over offshore accounts that K?l?cdaroglu alleged the President and his relatives hold in the Isle of Man, a self-governing British Crown dependency in the Irish Sea between England and Ireland.

Kilicdaroglu said late last year that the Erdogan's close circle engaged in multi-million dollar traffic through an off-shore company in the tax haven Isle of Man, later providing receipts of the transfers too.

The ruling AKP responded harshly to K?l?cdaroglu, dismissing the documents as "fake" and saying they should either be either revealed fully to the public or handed to prosecutors for further investigation.

One day after the accusations were made, Erdogan accused K?l?cdaroglu of "lying," saying the five people named "received money because they had sold their existing companies." "Money was not sent there," he said.

Erdogan also demanded 1.5 million liras in compensation over K?l?cdaroglu's statements.

The first court order issued regarding the allegations on June 7 demanded that the CHP leader to pay 185,000 Turkish Liras in compensation for "insulting" President Erdogan.

The latest "insult" case against the CHP leader is the latest in a series of such criminal investigations into Kilicdaroglu, including one launched by the Ankara Chief Public Prosecutor's Office on Dec. 6.

Erdogan's lawyer, Huseyin Ayd?n, had at that time posted the letter of complaint on his official Twitter account, quoting a speech K?l?cdaroglu delivered on Dec. 5.

The letter accused K?l?cdaroglu of voicing statements "that are part of a perception operation that the Fethullahist Terrorist Organization [FETO] has long been carrying out against our president." The authorities today refer to the network of U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gulen as "FETO," although it was once a close ally of Erdogan and the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

"The statements of the accused and the political party that he leads about our president overlap with the discourse of FETO," the letter added.

[04] "Euro court has rung the alarm bell for Turkish Cyprus"

"Attending the inauguration ceremony of Trans Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) on Jan. 12, the president of Turkish Cyprus drew attention to tension about energy resources in the Eastern Mediterranean. 'What is rational is to benefit from these natural resources with common wisdom. It our greatest hope for TANAP to inspire everyone', said Mustafa Ak?nc?.

By now it has become clear that the natural gas resources off the shore of Cyprus are not going to serve as a motivation to find a solution to the divided island. It has also become clear that the Greek Cypriot administration under Nicos Anastasiades is not willing to take the painful required steps to accept a solution based on a bi-communal, bi-zonal federation. He will continue the strategy of his predecessors to continue negotiations forever and play for time, in the belief that time is on the side of Greek Cyprus.

Although resentful and frustrated, the Turkish Cypriots may continue to live with the status quo while praying for a miracle to one day see the embargo implemented on them lifted, despite the absence of a solution. The problem is that the Greek Cypriots are not going to sit with their hands tied. They are likely to make every effort to make life even more difficult for the Turkish side.

They have already started to turn away non–EU nationals arriving at airports in the south with the intention of staying in hotels in the north. In April 2017, a group of Serbian pupils who arrived at Larnaca Airport in order to participate in a cultural event in the north were turned away. The same happened to a group of Lebanese tourists in September 2017. Until recently, Greek Cypriots did not dare to do the same to Israeli tourists who have shown great interest in visiting the north. Amid strains in Turkish–Israeli relations, the Greek Cypriot administration does not fear any reaction from Tel Aviv and last November 40 Israelis were expelled when they said they wanted to go to the north.

But more importantly, Greek Cyprus is trying to erode the diplomatic gains that Turkish Cyprus has acquired by setting up the Immovable Property Commission (IPC). Established in the mid-2000s to evaluate the Greek Cypriots' claims, the IPC was recognized as an effective remedy in 2010 by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which told all the Greek Cypriots with properties in the north to first apply to the commission in Turkish Cyprus.

Despite obstructions from the government, Greek Cypriots applied to the IPC in the thousands. But when the prospect of peace due to intercommunal negotiations slowed the work of the commission, this also suited the Turkish government, which did not want to earmark such a budget for compensation. Due to a halt in the flow of money, the IPC cannot take any decisions about all the applications in front of it.

In a decision it took last December, the ECHR condemned Turkey for the first time over the committee's ineffectiveness. After applying to the IPC in 2008 and getting no result, Greek Cypriot citizen Andriani Ioannou decided to apply to Strasbourg in 2014, which ended with the ECHR sentencing Turkey to pay 7,000 euros.

This should ring alarm bells for both Turkey and Turkish Cyprus. The Turkish side has to set up the financial mechanism to reactivate the IPC. Otherwise Ankara is going to be forced to earmark a much bigger budget for Cypriot properties in the north anyway, because if the ECHR decides on the ineffectiveness of the IPC and reverses its decision we will be back to 1996.

Following the ECHR's landmark decision in 1996 in the Loizidou case, thousands of Greek Cypriots with properties in the north applied to the Strasbourg court, which would have resulted in billions of euros in compensation paid by Turkey. The IPC was set up precisely to prevent this storm.

Not only will the IPC's compensation rates be much lower than those of the ECHR, it can also prioritize cases. If it were to compensate all of the applications in Morphu/Guzelyurt, the Greek Cypriot administration could no longer insist on the return of the province in the next round of negotiations. If the IPC were to decide on the return of some properties in former tourist attraction Varosha, the construction and tourism sectors would be boosted in the north. Compensating the Greek Cypriots will lead to a de facto solution for partition.

Ankara may currently be too preoccupied and, in addition, unwilling to start the flow of money in view of economic troubles. It should be up to the Turkish Cypriot government to take the lead and generate the necessary financial resources by introducing a tax system for Turkish Cypriot owners who will see a huge increase in the value of their properties, which used to belong to Greek Cypriots. These properties would therefore no longer be controversial. And that in turn would motivate Ankara to provide the main bulk of the financing".

[05] Albayrak: "Turkey's 3rd nuclear power plant will probably be constructed in Thrace"

Albayrak said further that Akkuyu, the first nuclear power plant will be operational in 2023 in the CNN Turk TV channel. Minister Albayrak said that the 3rd nuclear power plant will be built in Thrace because of the high electricity consumption in this plant.

[06] Polls present Erdogan to be the winner of the presidential election in first round

The poll, carried out by Foresight Dan?smanl?k and commissioned by Bloomberg, also revealed that Erdogan may win the elections in the first round. It involved 500 people between June 7 and 11.

The survey found that Erdogan, the presidential candidate of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) would receive 50.8%of the votes in the presidential elections. It also revealed that the People's Alliance between the AK Party and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) would get a majority in Parliament.

The sample was drawn from districts based on various demographic and socio-economic characteristic of Turkey and the margin of error was announced as 3.5 percentage points.

In the poll results, Erdogan was followed by Republican People's Party (CHP) presidential candidate, Muharrem Ince with 30.1% of the votes, and the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) candidate Selahattin Demirtas with 10.5%. While the Bloomberg poll substantiated the results of a number of earlier surveys, another poll by MAK Consultancy also placed Erdogan as the winner in the first round. According to the survey that involved 5,400 people from Turkey's 21 provinces between June 1 and June 6, Erdogan would receive 51.5% of the votes.

Several other pollsters have also shown Erdogan would lead the race in the first round of the presidential elections while indicating that he would still not garner enough votes to win in the first elections.

Another recent survey conducted by Remres Research pointed out that Erdogan may receive the highest percentage of support but there might be a second round of the elections. It estimated for Erdogan would get 42.2%, Ince 24.6%, Aksener 16.9% and Demirtas 12.3%. Recent election polls have not also been able to clearly indicate who will come second in the elections.

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TURKISH AFFAIRS SECTION

(AK / AM)

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