Turkiye detains Istanbul district mayor in corruption probe, state media says
Turkiye detains Istanbul district mayor in corruption probe, state media says/node/2611894/middle-east
Turkiye detains Istanbul district mayor in corruption probe, state media says
Beyoglu Mayor Inan Guney from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) was the 16th mayor to have been taken into custody in the crackdown, in which a total of more than 500 people have been detained in less than a year. (FILE/AFP)
Short Url
https://arab.news/wv9vj
Updated 15 August 2025
Reuters
Turkiye detains Istanbul district mayor in corruption probe, state media says
Turkish police detained 40 people including the mayor of Istanbul’s central Beyoglu district as part of a corruption investigation, state broadcaster TRT Haber said on Friday
Updated 15 August 2025
Reuters
ISTANBUL: Turkish police detained 40 people including the mayor of Istanbul’s central Beyoglu district as part of a corruption investigation, state broadcaster TRT Haber said on Friday, the latest wave in a crackdown on the opposition.
Beyoglu Mayor Inan Guney from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) was the 16th mayor to have been taken into custody in the crackdown, in which a total of more than 500 people have been detained in less than a year.
Among those currently in prison is Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, President Tayyip Erdogan’s main political rival, who is being investigated on charges of corruption and links to terrorism.
The CHP denies the charges and calls them an attempt to eliminate a democratic alternative, a charge the government rejects.
TRT Haber said those held in the latest operation are suspected of involvement in fraudulent activities at companies linked to the Istanbul municipality. Arrest warrants were issued for a total of 44 people, including the 40 detained, it said.
On Thursday, CHP mayor Ozlem Cercioglu from the western city of Aydin joined Erdogan’s ruling AK Party, citing disagreements with the CHP administration.
CHP leader Ozgur Ozel told reporters, without providing evidence, that AKP officials had threatened Cercioglu with legal investigations into her municipality and arrest unless she joined the ruling party.
AKP deputy chair Hayati Yazici called Ozel’s allegation “completely untrue.” Cercioglu also rejected the claim.
Syrian forces agree truce with French-led jihadist group
Syrian authorities have agreed a ceasefire with a group of jihadists led by Frenchman Oumar Diaby in northwest Syria, sources from both sides told AFP on Thursday
Updated 27 sec ago
AFP
IDLIB: Syrian authorities have agreed a ceasefire with a group of jihadists led by Frenchman Oumar Diaby in northwest Syria, sources from both sides told AFP on Thursday. Government forces surrounded the camp of Firqatul Ghuraba (“the Foreigners’ Brigade“) on Wednesday, leading to the first clashes with jihadists under Syria’s new leadership since the ousting in December of longtime ruler Bashar Assad. Diaby, also known as Omar Omsen, was accused of kidnapping a girl and had sought to prevent troops entering the camp in the Harem region near the Turkish border, which is home to a few dozen fighters. “An agreement was reached providing for a ceasefire, the withdrawal of heavy weapons (by the army),” and allowing the Syrian government to enter the camp, a local security official who requested anonymity told AFP. The written agreement, seen by AFP, also stipulates that a criminal investigation will be opened into the allegations of kidnapping against Diaby. The ceasefire was being respected on Thursday, according to the local security official and a source among the French jihadists contacted by AFP. Since taking power, Syria’s new leaders have sought to break from their own radical Islamist past and present a moderate image more tolerable to ordinary Syrians and foreign powers. Dealing with the thousands of heavily armed foreign fighters who flocked to the country during the country’s civil war is one of many security challenges facing Interim President Ahmed Al-Sharaa, who once led Al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria. In September 2016, the United States designated Diaby, suspected of helping French-speaking fighters travel to Syria, as an “international terrorist.” The Franco-Senegalese criminal-turned-preacher, 50, is also wanted on a French arrest warrant.
Turkiye says it will help boost Lebanese army’s capacity under mandate/node/2619946/middle-east
Turkiye says it will help boost Lebanese army’s capacity under mandate
Turkiye’s parliament passed a bill on Tuesday to renew the military’s deployment mandates in Syria and Iraq by three more years, and its deployment mandate under the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) by two years
Updated 23 October 2025
Reuters
ANKARA: Turkish peacekeeping forces will continue to help boost the Lebanese army’s capability under a renewed deployment mandate in Lebanon, Turkiye’s Defense Ministry said on Thursday.
Turkiye’s parliament passed a bill on Tuesday to renew the military’s deployment mandates in Syria and Iraq by three more years, and its deployment mandate under the UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) by two years.
“Efforts will continue to improve security conditions in the region, ensure stability and assist in the capacity building of the Lebanese armed forces, with the aim of establishing and maintaining peace in Lebanon,” the ministry said in a statement.
NATO member Turkiye, which took part in mediation that led to the Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal in Gaza, condemned Israeli offensives in the Palestinian enclave and regional countries including Lebanon, saying that “genocidal” and “expansionist” Israeli policies remained the biggest threat to regional peace.
Separately, the Defense Ministry said in its weekly briefing that the renewed Iraq and Syria mandates aimed to preserve Turkiye’s national security against attempts to harm the territorial integrity of its two neighbors.
Turkiye has been frustrated by what it calls the stalling of the US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in terms of implementing a landmark integration agreement that it signed with Syria’s government in March.
Ankara views the SDF as a terrorist organization linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which has been in a disarmament process that Turkiye says must apply to the SDF as well. It has warned of military action against the SDF and said Damascus should address its concerns.
In the mandate passed on Tuesday, parliament said the move was necessary because “terrorist organizations continued their presence in the region” and the SDF was “rejecting taking steps toward integrating into Syria’s central administration over its separatist and discriminatory agenda.”
Israel’s top court postpones petition demanding media access to Gaza
Israel’s Supreme Court on Thursday pushed back the hearing of a petition demanding independent access for journalists to Gaza
Updated 23 October 2025
AFP
JERUSALEM: Israel’s Supreme Court on Thursday pushed back the hearing of a petition filed by an organization representing international media outlets in Israel and the Palestinian territories, demanding independent access for journalists to Gaza.
Since the Gaza war began in October 2023, Israeli authorities have prevented foreign journalists from entering the devastated territory, taking only a handful of reporters inside on tightly controlled visits alongside its troops.
On Thursday, Israel’s top court began the hearing of a petition filed by the Foreign Press Association (FPA) seeking access to Gaza.
The State Attorney acknowledged “the situation has changed” and requested a further 30 days to examine the circumstances. No date has been set for the next hearing.
Ahead of the hearing, FPA chairperson Tania Kraemer said: “We’ve been waiting really long for this day.”
“We are saying that we hope to get into Gaza, that they open Gaza after this long blockade, and we are hoping to get in there to work alongside our Palestinian colleagues,” she added.
The FPA, which represents hundreds of foreign journalists, began petitioning for independent access to Gaza soon after the war broke out in October 2023 following Hamas’s attack on Israel.
But these demands have been repeatedly ignored by Israeli authorities.
An AFP journalist sits on the FPA’s board of directors. ’No excuse’
“We have a right to inform the public, the people of the world, the Israeli public, the Palestinian population,” Nicolas Rouget, an FPA board member, said outside the courtroom ahead of the hearing.
“We feel we must stand by them, by our Palestinian colleagues in Gaza, who have been the only ones able to inform the public about this conflict over the last two years,” he added.
Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has joined the petition filed by the FPA.
While Israel has prevented foreign reporters from entering Gaza, its forces have killed more than 210 Palestinian journalists in the territory, Antoine Bernard, RSF’s director for advocacy and assistance, said on Tuesday.
“The result is an unprecedented violation of press freedom and the public’s right to reliable, independent, and pluralistic media reporting,” Bernard said.
“The Supreme Court has the opportunity to finally uphold basic democratic principles in the face of widespread propaganda, disinformation, and censorship, and to end two years of meticulous and unrestrained destruction of journalism in and about Gaza.
“No excuse, no restriction can justify not opening Gaza to international, Israeli and Palestinian media,” he said.
On October 10, Israel declared a ceasefire and started pulling back troops from some areas of the territory, as part of US President Donald Trump’s 20-point plan to end the war.
Drone attacks in Khartoum for third consecutive day: witnesses
A witness said he saw the drones heading toward the airport
Updated 23 October 2025
AFP
KHARTOUM: Drones targeted the army-held Sudanese capital and its airport on Thursday, witnesses told AFP, marking the third consecutive day of such strikes.
“At 4:00 am (0200 GMT) I heard the sound of two drones passing above us,” one witness said, adding that the drones were headed toward military facilities.
Another witness meanwhile said he saw the drones heading toward the airport, adding that he heard explosions shortly afterwards.
Since Tuesday, the airport — out of service for over two years — has come under repeated drone attacks blamed on the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which the regular army has been battling since April 2023.
The airport was due to reopen on Wednesday, but this was postponed “under further notice,” an airport official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
Following a months-long offensive, the army recaptured Khartoum from the RSF in March, but the city remains largely devastated, with frequent power outages and the paramilitaries intensifying drone attacks on the city.
More than a million people who had been displaced by the war have returned over the past 10 months, according to the United Nations’ migration agency.
In the past weeks, the government has sought to reopen key services and move institutions back to Khartoum after they had largely fled to the de facto capital of Port Sudan on the Red Sea coast.
Now well into its third year, the war in Sudan has killed tens of thousands of people, displaced about 12 million more and triggered one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
Rubio heads to Israel as West Bank annexation moves threaten Gaza truce efforts
Israeli lawmakers voted Wednesday to advance two bills on annexing the occupied West Bank
Updated 23 October 2025
AFP
WASHINGTON: Top US diplomat Marco Rubio warned that Israel’s moves toward annexing the occupied West Bank risked undermining a fragile US-brokered truce in Gaza, as he headed to Israel on Thursday.
Israeli lawmakers on Wednesday advanced two bills paving the way for West Bank annexation, days after President Donald Trump secured a ceasefire deal aimed at ending Israel’s two-year offensive in Gaza, launched after Hamas’s October 2023 attacks.
“I think the president’s made clear that’s not something we can be supportive of right now,” Rubio said of annexation as he boarded his plane for a visit to Israel.
Annexation moves are “threatening for the peace deal,” he told reporters, acknowledging the Israeli lawmakers’ latest steps.
“At this time, it’s something that we... think might be counterproductive,” Rubio said.
Asked about increased violence by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank, Rubio said: “We’re concerned about anything that threatens to destabilize what we’ve worked on.”
Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967, and violence there has surged since the start of the war in Gaza.
According to the Ramallah-based Palestinian health ministry, Israeli troops and settlers have killed nearly 1,000 Palestinians, including militants and civilians, since October 2023.
Over the same period, at least 43 Israelis, including members of the security forces, have been killed in Palestinian attacks or Israeli operations, official figures show.
The United States remains the primary military and diplomatic supporter of Israel, and Rubio until recently had steered clear of criticizing annexation moves championed by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right allies.
But a number of Arab and Muslim countries, which Washington has been courting in a bid to provide troops and money for a stabilization force in Gaza, have warned that annexation of the West Bank was a red line.
Hamas’s moderate rivals in the Palestinian Authority exercise limited self-rule in parts of the West Bank.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio. (AFP)
Daily threats to truce
Rubio is the latest in a string of top US officials to visit Israel to shore up the ceasefire, following Vice President JD Vance, who was due to conclude his own trip later on Thursday.
Rubio did not rule out that the ceasefire would face threats.
“Every day there’ll be threats to it, but I actually think we’re ahead of schedule in terms of bringing it together, and the fact that we made it through this weekend is a good sign,” Rubio said.
“This was a historic peace deal that President Trump delivered on, and now we have to make sure that it continues and that we continue to build upon it.”
The truce faced its toughest test Sunday, when Israeli forces launched strikes in Gaza after two soldiers were killed. The strikes killed at least 45 Palestinians, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.
Witnesses reported artillery fire in Khan Yunis on Thursday but no casualties.
During his visit, Vance warned that disarming Hamas while rebuilding Gaza would be a challenge.
“We have a very, very tough task ahead of us, which is to disarm Hamas but rebuild Gaza, to make life better for the people of Gaza, but also to ensure that Hamas is no longer a threat to our friends in Israel,” Vance said Wednesday.
The vice president inaugurated the new Civil-Military Coordination Center (CMCC) in southern Israel, where US and allied forces will work with Israeli counterparts to monitor the truce and coordinate aid deliveries.
Under Trump’s 20-point peace plan, an international security force drawn from Arab and Muslim allies would oversee Gaza’s transition as Israeli troops withdraw.
The force would not have US troops deployed inside Gaza.
Netanyahu, facing criticism from his far-right allies for accepting the ceasefire before Hamas was destroyed, defended the agreement, calling it a success that “put the knife up to Hamas’s throat” while isolating the group regionally.
‘Children’s future slipping away’
In Gaza, civilians displaced by two years of war continued to struggle.
“We were afraid of dying during the war, and now we’re afraid of living after it,” said Maher Abu Wafah, 42.
“Our lives and our children’s future are slipping away before our eyes. We just want a stable life.”
As the US diplomatic visits continued, the International Court of Justice issued an advisory opinion urging Israel to ensure Palestinians’ access to essential goods and humanitarian aid.
Israel dismissed the ruling as a “political attempt” to pressure it under the guise of law.
A senior UN official warned Wednesday of “generational” impacts in Gaza from malnutrition among pregnant women and babies, urging a surge of aid to help prevent potential lifelong health issues.
Andrew Saberton, deputy executive director of the UN Population Fund, said 11,500 pregnant women face “catastrophic” conditions, with starvation posing severe risks to both mothers and newborns.
