Christians, Muslims mourn murdered French priest

Yahoo – AFP, Sophie Deviller with Myriam Chaplain-Riou in Lyon, July 30, 2016

People hold a banner reading "We will overcome" as they take part in a silent march
 on July 30, 2016 in Lyon following the fatal attack on a French priest (AFP Photo/
Jean-Philippe Ksiazek)

Paris (AFP) - Muslim and Christian groups came together Saturday to mourn a French priest murdered by jihadists, as authorities charged a man in connection with the brutal church attack that rocked the nation.

A shellshocked France is still coming to terms with the jihadist killing of the clergyman at the altar in his church, sparking fears of tensions between religions in the secular nation.

Priest Jacques Hamel was killed in a

 brutal attack at his church of Saint-Etienne-

du-Rouvray, northern France (AFP Photo)

In a bid to forge togetherness between the communities, a "brotherhood march" was held in the southeastern city of Lyon, supported by a regional Muslim council and a Catholic group.

Hundreds of people marched in silence, as mourners at the front of the crowd carried banners that read: "This is not a religious war" and "We are all brothers and sisters."

"We think it is crucial to leave no room for resignation, resentment or fear, and to take a stand for togetherness," Abdelkader Bendidi, who heads the regional Muslim council, said in a statement.

"Let's not give the agents of terror a second victory by giving in to hate," said Azzedine Gaci, a local imam.

'Criminal conspiracy'

"It doesn't matter what our religious beliefs are, or if we have none at all. These attacks won't divide us. Instead, they will unite us around one idea: reconciliation," said Foucauld Giuliani, of a Catholic group.

In the southwestern city of Bordeaux, some 400 people attended a vigil for the 85-year-old Jacques Hamel, who had his throat slit by IS-inspired teenaged attackers.

Graphic showing the movements of France church attackers Adel Kermiche 

and Abdel Malik Petitjean (AFP Photo/Sophie RAMIS, Simon MALFATTO,

Laurence SAUBADU)

Prayers were also held in the Saint-Etienne church where the killing took place as Hamel was celebrating mass on Tuesday.

Among the 300 people who attended the evening mass in northern Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, some 50 were Muslims.

Police were still trying to piece together links to the two 19-year-olds who carried out the attack -- Adel Kermiche and Abdel Malik Petitjean -- both of whom were on intelligence services' radar and had tried to go to Syria.

On Friday, authorities filed charges against a 19-year-old man accused of "criminal conspiracy with terrorists" after police discovered a mobile phone video of one of the assailants at his home.

Police were still questioning Petitjean's cousin and a Syrian refugee, after a photocopy of his passport was found at Kermiche's house.

A 16-year-old was released but could ultimately face a separate investigation for possessing jihadist propaganda, authorities added.

A source close to the enquiry said that a 17-year-old, who had tried to travel to Syria with Kermiche, was arrested in Geneva and sent back to France just a few days before the attack.

However, "nothing suggests he was in any way implicated in the attack" at this stage, the source added.

Both French Prime Minister Manuel Valls and Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve have come under fire for perceived security failings.

Valls has said he would consider a temporary ban on foreign financing of mosques, urging a "new model" for relations with Islam after a spate of jihadist attacks.

France has just over 2,000 mosques, for one of Europe's largest Muslim populations of around five million.

Muslims hold a minute of silence on July 29, 2016 in front of the church if 

Saint-Etienne-du-Rouvray, where French priest Jacques Hamel was killed

(AFP Photo/Charly Triballeau )

'Peace, it's what we want'

Since the assault, harrowing details have emerged about what happened in the church as well as a chilling warning from one of the attackers.

On Friday, L'Express magazine revealed that Kermiche had described the modus operandi of the attack on the encrypted messaging app Telegram.

"You take a knife, you go into a church. Bam!" says the message recorded just a few days before the attack.

Meanwhile, two elderly nuns who were in the church at the time of the attack told AFP the assailants "smiled" and spoke about peace.

Sister Helena said when asked if she was familiar with Islam's holy book, she said she had read several suras especially those about peace.

According to the nun, one of the attackers replied: "Peace, it's what we want... as long as there are bombs on Syria, we will continue our attacks. And they will happen every day. When you stop, we will stop."

Muslims pray with Catholics around France over priest's 'barbaric' murder https://t.co/ax6q62yunX pic.twitter.com/lSscHhhEgF

— AFP news agency (@AFP) July 31, 2016

Related Articles:

Pope says Islam is not terrorism
Muslims pray with Catholics over priest's 'barbaric' murder

Iman Sami Salem (L) and Imam Mohammed ben Mohammed (R) stand during a 

mass in the church Santa Maria in trastevere in Rome on July 31, 2016 (AFP

Photo/Tiziana Fabi)

"The Recalibration of Awareness – Apr 20/21, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Old Energy, Recalibration Lectures, God / Creator, Religions/Spiritual systems  (Catholic Church, Priests/Nun’s, Worship, John Paul Pope, Women in the Church otherwise church will go, Current Pope won’t do it),  Middle East, Jews, Governments will change (Internet, Media, Democracies, Dictators, North Korea, Nations voted at once), Integrity (Businesses, Tobacco Companies, Bankers/ Financial Institutes, Pharmaceutical company to collapse),  Illuminati (Started in Greece, with Shipping, Financial markets, Stock markets, Pharmaceutical money (fund to build Africa, to develop)), Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Women, Masters to/already come back, Global Unity.... etc.) - (Text version)

“.   New Tolerance

Look for a softening of finger pointing and an awakening of new tolerance. There will remain many systems for different cultures, as traditions and history are important to sustaining the integrity of culture. So there are many in the Middle East who would follow the prophet and they will continue, but with an increase of awareness. It will be the increase of awareness of what the prophet really wanted all along - unity and tolerance. The angel in the cave instructed him to "unify the tribes and give them the God of Israel." You're going to start seeing a softening of intolerance and the beginning of a new way of being.

Eventually, this will create an acknowledgement that says, "You may not believe the way we believe, but we honor you and your God. We honor our prophet and we will love you according to his teachings. We don't have to agree in order to love." How would you like that? The earth is not going to turn into one belief system. It never will, for Humans don't do that. There must be variety, and there must be the beauty of cultural differences. But the systems will slowly update themselves with increased awareness of the truth of a new kind of balance. So that's the first thing. Watch for these changes, dear ones. ...."

Defiant Merkel defends refugee stance after attacks

Yahoo – AFP, Deborah Cole, July 28, 2016

Chancellor Angela Merkel and fellow German politicians have issued strongly
 worded statements against Erdogan's crackdown following the putsch (AFP
Photo/Tobias Schwarz)

Berlin (AFP) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Thursday rebuffed calls to reverse her welcoming stance toward refugees after a series of brutal attacks in the country.

Merkel, who interrupted her summer holiday to face the media in Berlin, said the four assaults within a week were "shocking, oppressive and depressing" but not a sign that authorities had lost control.

The German leader said the assailants "wanted to undermine our sense of community, our openness and our willingness to help people in need".

"We firmly reject this," she said at a wide-ranging news conference.

Merkel repeated her rallying cry from last year when she opened the borders to people fleeing war and persecution, many from Syria, which brought nearly 1.1 million migrants and refugees to Germany in 2015.

"I am still convinced today that 'we can do it' -- it is our historic duty and this is a historic challenge in times of globalisation," she said.

"We have already achieved very, very much in the last 11 months."

Merkel was speaking after a axe rampage, a shooting spree, a knife attack and a suicide bombing stunned Germany, leaving 13 people dead, including three assailants, and dozens wounded.

Three of the four attackers were asylum seekers, and two of the assaults were claimed by the Islamic State group.

Merkel said that she would not allow jihadists, following a series of deadly attacks in France, Belgium, Turkey and the US state of Florida, to keep her government from being guided by reason and compassion.

"Despite the great unease these events inspire, fear can't be the guide for political decisions," she said.

"It is my deep conviction that we cannot let our way of life be destroyed."

'Urgent action'

While the German political class has largely called for calm, opposition parties and rebels from Merkel's own conservative bloc have accused her of exposing the country to unacceptable risks without stricter controls on people let in.

Germany's spate of attacks (AFP Photo/Simon MALFATTO,

 Iris ROYER DE VERICOURT)

"Islamist terrorism has unfortunately arrived in Bavaria," the state's interior minister Joachim Herrmann told reporters Thursday, renewing calls by his Christian Social Union party for an upper limit on the number of new asylum seekers.

"We are awaiting urgent action from the federal government and Europe."

Merkel announced a string of new security measures including improving an "early-warning system" to detect radicalisation among refugees, training the military to respond to major attacks, boosting intelligence cooperation with allies and speeding up deportation of rejected asylum seekers.

The deadliest attack came last Friday when a German-Iranian teenager who was born and raised in Munich opened fire at a downtown shopping mall, killing nine people before turning the gun on himself.

He had been under psychiatric treatment and investigators say he was obsessed with mass shootings, including Norwegian rightwing fanatic Anders Behring Breivik's 2011 massacre.

They have ruled out an Islamist motive, saying the assailant had far-right "sympathies".

On July 18, an asylum seeker from Afghanistan or Pakistan slashed train passengers and a passer-by with an axe and a knife in Wuerzburg before being shot by police.

And on Sunday, a failed Syrian asylum seeker blew himself up outside a music festival in Ansbach, wounding 15 people at a nearby cafe after being turned away from the packed open-air venue. IS claimed both attacks.

Already steeped in grief and shock, Germans were further rattled by news that a Syrian refugee had killed a 45-year-old Polish woman with a large kebab knife at a snack bar in the southwestern city of Reutlingen Sunday in what authorities called a personal dispute.

Looming elections

The German attacks came with two state elections looming in September, in Berlin and in Merkel's fiefdom of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.

The rightwing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party hopes to make a particularly strong showing there with a campaign against "Islamisation", which would deal Merkel a stinging blow one year ahead of a general election.

Merkel's popularity had suffered earlier this year, following a rash of sexual assaults in the western city of Cologne on New Year's Eve blamed mainly on Arab and North African men.

But her poll ratings had recently recovered as the refugee influx has slowed dramatically due to the closure of the Balkan migrant route and an EU deal with Turkey to stem the flow.

Analysts are awaiting new data to see what impact the recent attacks have had on her support.

Nightly demonstrations follow failed coup in Turkey

Since the failed coup, protesters have filled squares throughout Turkey on a nightly basis. On July 15, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on supporters to take to the streets to defend his regime from the military.

Deutsche Welle, 23 July 2016

Thousands of people have flocked to squares across Turkey on a nightly basis since President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called supporters to the streets on July 15, the evening of the failed coup. The supporters of the regime have become known as the "Democracy Watch."

"I still think there is a threat," 26-year-old Muhittin Bayhantopcu said on Istanbul's Taksim Square Friday evening. "This threat is against the entire country, toward all groups. I'm here for democracy."

Thousands of people filled the square on Friday evening, many of them holding Turkish flags. There were women wearing religious coverings such as chadors, men with tattoos on motorcycles, men wearing Islamic skullcaps, and men wearing sleeveless shirts and shorts. Most people appeared to be conservative. Some demonstrators brought their children.

"In this country, there always was and is the threat of a military coup," a university student said. "I know this because I study history." She said she had voted for an opposition party in the most recent elections, but that that party had since characterized the post-coup assemblies on Taksim as nationalist. "But if the other parties displayed the same stance and were in the same place, everything would be different," the student said. "We would be a united nation. I'm here with my people."

Young and old have been lured to Turkey's squares by Erdogan's call to
defend democrarcy

'Security and tranquility'

Protests had been banned for the past three years on Taksim Square, where in 2013 demonstrators had railed against the regime and its plans to turn parts of Istanbul's beloved Gezi Park over to developers. The movement spread nationwide, and more than 20 people were killed in the crackdown. Things have gone more smoothly at these demonstrations, with some participants even posing for photos with the police. Queues for sandwiches distributed by the state stretch 70 meters (230 feet). "These marches must continue," President Erdogan said on Friday.

To facilitate that, public transit is running 24 hours and portable toilets have been put into use. "The danger has not yet passed," Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Friday. "The security and tranquility of our citizens has been ensured. But there is no room for complacency."

On one of two televisions on Taksim Square, a presenter read out the national anthem and encouraged the crowd to wave flags, which can be bought onsite for 5 lira (1.5 euro/$1.60). T-shirts bearing the phrase "Sovereignty belongs to the nation" are also for sale, as are headbands that say "Martyrs never die," scarves with Erdogan's name and image, and flag-themed key chains. People chant "God is great" or slogans referencing the flag's red and white.

"This country is ours," an older woman said on Friday. "This land is ours. This flag is ours." She wouldn't give her name, but it was clear that her sympathies did not lie with the coup's plotters: "My Lord didn't side with these traitors. He protected us."

Red carnations were piled in front of a podium, near the listed names of the people killed during the coup attempt. There were two notebooks on the podium to allow mourners and patriots to express their thoughts.

"What is it like to lie in front of a tank?" said 43-year-old Ilhan Atac, who had come to the square with his 4-year-old daughter, explaining what he had written in one of the notebooks. "How brave must one be to use their chest as a shield from bullets? I thanked my martyrs for doing these things. I said that since we are a great nation, we would not fall apart."

On the stage, the master of ceremonies reminded the crowd that people were on city squares across Turkey. He listed the cities, asking "Are you here?" The demonstrators replied: "We're here. We're here until further notice."

Twenty-four-year-old textile worker Selahattin Ergün had been here for the past five nights. "I'm happy to be together with these people," he said. "Kurds, Turks, Zaza, Circassians, and Laz - I'm seeing everyone in unity together here right now."

#Istanbul : First cross-party rally to condemn the #TurkeyCoupAttempt Photos @Kilicbil @ozannkosee @PhotographyGO pic.twitter.com/gbupHQVaas

— AFP Photo Department (@AFPphoto) July 24, 2016

Related Articles:

Pro-Erdogan supporters wave a Turkish flag during a rally at Bosphorus bridge

in Istanbul on July 21, 2016 (AFP Photo/Umit Turhan Coskun)

Turkey detains senior Gulen aide after coup attempt
Turkey to disband presidential guard after post-coup detentions: PM


Mini Channelling Grand Rapids, Michigan - July 16-17, 2016 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll)  (With reference to global changes & Turkey coup > 10.10 min) - New

Amsterdam turns pink and gears up for 15 days of EuroPride

DutchNews, July 22, 2016

The canal parade in 2015. Photo: Amaury Miller via HH

Fifteen days of parties, debates, concerts and other events start in Amsterdam on Saturday as the Dutch capital hosts EuroPride 2016. 

EuroPride, first held in 1991, takes place in a different European city every year and is being hosted by the Dutch capital in 2016 to mark 20 years of the Amsterdam Gay Pride organisation. This year the event has the motto ‘’join our freedom’. 

Over 300 events will take place between July 23 and August 7, including Pink Saturday at the Vondelpark and a pro human rights concert on Dam Square this Sunday. The traditional canal boat parade on August 6 includes floats hosted by gay Moroccans, LGBT Jews and the police force, as well as the European Commission.

‘We will celebrate that freedom but at the same time continue the fight for equal rights in Europe,’ Lucien Spee, director of the Amsterdam Gay Pride organisation, told the festival’s magazine.

‘This will continue until we have the right to be who we are, to have families, to lead full lives and to develop the careers that we want, wherever we are until we are fully accepted and embraced with dignity by our families, neighbours and colleagues throughout Europe.’ 

Tolerance

Despite the Netherlands’ reputation for tolerance – the country was the first to legalise gay marriage for example – some 32% still consider two men kissing in public to be offensive, according to research published by the government’s socio-cultural think tank SCP in May. 

Almost one in four people finds the sight of two women kissing to be offensive, while 12% find a heterosexual couple kissing in public to be objectionable.   

While 83% of the native Dutch have no objections to gay marriage, just 27% of the Dutch Somali population and 30% of the Dutch Moroccan population think the same. 

Nevertheless, the percentage of people with an immigrant background who do not accept homosexuality and would be unhappy if their child was gay has gone down over the past eight years, the SCP figures show. 

Attacks 

Despite this, there has been a reported rise in attacks on gay men and women over the past years, but, experts say, this may be partly due to an increased willingness to report hate crimes. 

‘Tolerance has become part of the national myth, and it’s being instrumentalised by the right-wing party and the media. So nowadays you’ll hear a lot more about incidents between Muslim youths and gays because it serves the anti-immigration discourse,’ University of Amsterdam sociologist  Laurens Buijs told website Iamsterdam.com. 

‘But it’s also because the LGBT arm of the Dutch police, the Roze in Blauw (‘Pink in Blue’), has done a fabulous job at fostering a trusting relationship with the community,’ he said. 

Roze in Blauw spokeswoman Ellie Lust told the website: ‘We have lowered the threshold of tolerance for discrimination, and victims now come to us to report even verbal attacks. This has definitely affected the statistics.’

HEMA is van en voor iedereen. Daarom vieren we #pride2016 met deze limited edition shirts: https://t.co/mjM6GT6d32 pic.twitter.com/Yg61zBupoA

— HEMA (@HEMA) July 22, 2016

Related Articles:

"The Recalibration of Awareness – Apr 20/21, 2012 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Old Energy, Recalibration Lectures, God / Creator, Religions/Spiritual systems  (Catholic Church, Priests/Nun’s, Worship, John Paul Pope, Women in the Church otherwise church will go, Current Pope won’t do it),  Middle East, Jews, Governments will change (Internet, Media, Democracies, Dictators, North Korea, Nations voted at once), Integrity (Businesses, Tobacco Companies, Bankers/ Financial Institutes, Pharmaceutical company to collapse),  Illuminati (Started in Greece, with Shipping, Financial markets, Stock markets, Pharmaceutical money (fund to build Africa, to develop)), Shift of Human Consciousness, (Old) Souls, Women, Masters to/already come back, Global Unity.... etc.) - (Text version)

“.   New Tolerance

Look for a softening of finger pointing and an awakening of new tolerance. There will remain many systems for different cultures, as traditions and history are important to sustaining the integrity of culture. So there are many in the Middle East who would follow the prophet and they will continue, but with an increase of awareness. It will be the increase of awareness of what the prophet really wanted all along - unity and tolerance. The angel in the cave instructed him to "unify the tribes and give them the God of Israel." You're going to start seeing a softening of intolerance and the beginning of a new way of being.

Eventually, this will create an acknowledgement that says, "You may not believe the way we believe, but we honor you and your God. We honor our prophet and we will love you according to his teachings. We don't have to agree in order to love." How would you like that? The earth is not going to turn into one belief system. It never will, for Humans don't do that. There must be variety, and there must be the beauty of cultural differences. But the systems will slowly update themselves with increased awareness of the truth of a new kind of balance. So that's the first thing. Watch for these changes, dear ones. ...."

"The Akashic Circle" – Jul 17, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll) - (Subjects: Religion, The Humanization of God, Benevolent Design, DNA, Akashic Circle, (Old) Souls, Gaia, Indigenous People, Talents, Reincarnation, Genders, Gender Switches, In “between” Gender Change, Gender Confusion, Shift of Human Consciousness, Global Unity,..... etc.)  - (Text version)

“… Gender Switching

Old souls, let me tell you something. If you are old enough, and many of you are, you have been everything. Do you hear me? All of you. You have been both genders. All of you have been what I will call between genders, and that means that all of you have had gender switches. Do you know what happens when it's time for you to switch a gender? We have discussed it before. You'll have dozens of lifetimes as the same gender. You're used to it. It's comfortable. You cannot conceive of being anything else, yet now it's time to change. It takes approximately three lifetimes for you to get used to it, and in those three lifetimes, you will have what I call "gender confusion."

It isn't confusion at all. It's absolutely normal, yet society often will see it as abnormal. I'm sitting here telling you you've all been through it. All of you. That's what old souls do. It's part of the system. …”

Turkey's Erdogan declares state of emergency after coup attempt

Yahoo – AFP, 20 Jul 2016

Pro-Erdogan supporters wave Turkish national flags during a rally at
Taksim square in Istanbul on July 18, 2016

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday declared a three-month state of emergency in Turkey in order to hunt down all those deemed to be behind an attempted coup.

The state of emergency was needed "in order to remove swiftly all the elements of the terrorist organisation involved in the coup attempt," he said at the presidential palace in Ankara.

Turkey has accused the group of US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen of being behind the coup and acting as a terror group. Gulen vehemently denies the charge.

"The decision has been made to declare the state of emergency for a period of three months," he said at a news conference.

He said the state of emergency is a measure "against the terror threat facing our country".

The announcement followed long meetings of Turkey's national security council and cabinet chaired by Erdogan at the presidential palace.

Erdogan vowed that democracy would not be compromised in Turkey.

"We have never made compromises on democracy. And we will never make" them, Erdogan told a news conference in Ankara.

Dutch lorry maker DAF fined €753m for cartel forming over 14 years

DutchNews, July 19, 2016

Photo: Alf van Beem via
Wikimedia Commons 

The European Commission has fined a group of truck manufacturers, including Dutch firm DAF, a total of €2.93bn for operating as an illegal cartel for 14 years. 

The commission said in a statement that MAN, Volvo/Renault, Daimler, Iveco, and DAF had broken EU antitrust rules by colluding on truck pricing and on passing on the costs of compliance with stricter emission rules. The cartel operated between 1997 and 2011, the commission said. 

Eindhoven-based DAF was given the second biggest fine of nearly €753m. 

MAN was not fined as it revealed the existence of the cartel to the Commission. All companies acknowledged their involvement in the cartel and agreed to settle the case.

‘It is not acceptable that MAN, Volvo/Renault, Daimler, Iveco and DAF, which together account for around nine out of every 10 medium and heavy trucks produced in Europe, were part of a cartel instead of competing with each other,’ competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager said in a statement. 

DAF has been part of American listed industrial group PACCAR since 1996.

Related Article:

EU fines truckmakers for 14-year cartel

EU critical of Turkey's post-coup crackdown

European leaders have reacted with alarm to Turkey's purges following the weekend's failed coup attempt. European leaders caution that the rule of law must be respected as the number detained exceeds 9,000.

Deutsche Welle, 18 Jul 2016

European leaders said Monday that Turkey's widespread crackdowns on police, the judiciary and the military are increasingly alarming and threaten stability and EU-Turkey relations.

"We are the ones saying today rule of law has to be protected in the country," the EU's foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said in Brussels. "There is no excuse for any steps that take the country away from that."

We call for an end to use of violence. Societal tensions can only be addressed through democratic processes #Turkey https://t.co/TUfQxCiTUn

— Federica Mogherini (@FedericaMog) July 16, 2016

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has doubled down with vows that the "cleansing" of state institutions will continue as around 9,000 people were arrested, and the military announced the formal end of the failed coup.

Alarm in Germany and beyond

In Germany, Norbert Röttgen, Christian Democratic Union (CDU) member and chair of the foreign relations committee of the Bundestag, says there is evidence that Erdogan is using the coup to make a power play to further exclude oppositional political forces.

"This is to say that President Erdogan would use this coup to consolidate his power mostly by eliminating constraints and the opposition," Röttgen said in an interview with the German newspaper Die Welt.

Thousands of military officers and
rank-and-file soldiers whose loyalties are
 under suspicion are being rounded up
across Turkey

Senior figures within the center-right CDU - the party of Chancellor Angela Merkel - have become increasingly skeptical of Erdogan and question Ankara's reliability as a diplomatic and security partner. Rumblings are also being heard within the CDU's coalition partner, the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD).

Erdogan's talk of restoring capital punishment is also alarming diplomats in other European capitals.

"In a democracy, you cannot ignore the demands of people," Erdogan said Sunday evening, citing chants from supporters calling for the death penalty, which was formally abolished in 2004.

That would be unacceptable, Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz, a frequent Erdogan critic in Europe, told Austrian newspaper Kurier.

"The introduction of the death penalty would of course be absolutely unacceptable," Kurz said in remarks published Monday. "There must be no arbitrary purges, no criminal sanctions outside the framework of the rule of law and the justice system."

Restoring the death penalty would almost certainly scuttle Turkey's halting bid for EU accession, which was reactivated as part of a comprehensive deal for Turkey to contain mass migration from Syria, Iraq and elsewhere to the EU.

Settling old scores?

Arrests in Cankiri

Turkey has blamed the attempted coup on loyalists tied to US-based Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile since 1999. Ankara has repeated demands that the US extradite Gulen but to date has not offered formal evidence of criminal wrongdoing.

Some EU leaders are worried that Turkey could be using the unrest to settle old scores against Gulen, a former ally turned rival of Erdogan.

Johannes Hahn, the EU commissioner dealing with Turkey's membership bid, said that given the wide-ranging types of people under suspicion, a comprehensive dossier could only have been drawn up in advance.

"It looks at least as if something has been prepared," Hahn said Monday. "The lists are available, which indicates it was prepared and to be used at a certain stage."

Arrests in Izmir

Meanwhile in Istanbul, police commandos raided the prestigious air force military academy in search of new suspects, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.

Authorities have also detained General Mehmet Disli, who conducted the operation to capture Turkey's chief of staff Hulusi Akar during the stand-off.

Reports had said that a total of 36 generals had been detained so far. The private Turkish Dogan news agency reported Monday that 10 of them had now been remanded in custody by the courts.

The Turkish president has urged citizens to remain on the streets even after the defeat of the coup, in what the authorities describe as a "vigil" for democracy but witnesses describe as gatherings mainly made up of supporters of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) co-founded by Erdogan.

jar/kms (AFP, Reuters, dpa)

Related Article:

US invitesTurkey to present any Gulen coup evidence

Google boss defends Europe tax practices, warns of Brexit

Google CEO Sundar Pichai has refuted accusations the tech giant failed to pay enough taxes in Europe, saying it was up to politicians to improve the tax system. Pichai also warned of the possible fallout from Brexit.

Deutsche Welle, 17 Jul 2016

In an interview with Germany's "Welt am Sonntag" newspaper, Pichai said that the US company had invested "very heavily" in Europe, where it employs around 14,000 people.

"As a global company, we find ourselves between the conflicting priorities of international tax law," he said, just a few weeks after two of Google's European offices were raided by tax inspectors.

"Based on the structure of existing tax law, most companies pay the bulk of their taxes in their home countries," Pichai insisted, adding that individual governments would have to take action if they wanted more revenue to stay at home.

"Only the further development of the global tax system by politicians can lead to better results," the Google chief told the paper. If new international tax laws were passed, the search giant would adhere to them, Pichai added.

Two tax raids

Sundar Pichai has worked for
Google since 2004

Google's offices in Madrid were searched in a tax probe in late June, just over a month after police raided the Internet behemoth in Paris in a similar investigation. French officials allege the tech company owes them 1.6 billion euros ($1.77 billion) in unpaid taxes and fines.

Tax inspectors are attempting to prove that sales booked by Google in both countries are much higher than those reported to tax authorities.

The swoops are among a series of regulatory worries for Google, which is also confronting a third anti-trust charge by the European Commission over its online search advertising and shopping business. The company already faces action over its Android smartphone operating system.

Tax shaming?

In January, Google settled on a 155 million euro tax agreement with British authorities, a deal heavily criticized as insufficient compared to the revenue it generates in the country.

Tech giants like Google, Amazon and Apple have faced criticism over their tax liabilities as many of the firms take advantage of tax breaks in Ireland, Belgium and Luxembourg for their European headquarters.

Pichai also warned that Britain's decision to leave the European Union may bring difficulties for internet companies as digital regulation diverges.

"As companies we see great value in Europe as a unified digital market," he said, warning that it was a challenge to keep up with varying laws and regulations in every country. "The complexity makes a bigger commitment difficult, which can be seen in investments," he added.

mm/jlw (AFP, dpa)