Day: September 5, 2022

Türkiye knows that those who stir up unrest through harassment in the Aegean Sea are at every turn act as “someone’s pawns,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday, referring to Greece.

“We know that those who sow unrest in the Aegean at every opportunity with their harassment and rudeness are only pawns,” Erdogan said at a military ceremony in Istanbul.

Erdogan added that Türkiye is also well aware of the clamor being made in the Eastern Mediterranean to undermine the country’s interests.

His remarks came after Turkish jets engaged in NATO missions over the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean Seas on Aug. 23 were harassed by a Russian-made S-300 air defense system stationed on the Greek island of Crete.

Greek military officials have denied the Turkish account of the actions, which are described as “hostile” in the NATO Rules of Engagement.

Türkiye’s National Defense Ministry is preparing to send radar records of the incident to the NATO Secretariat-General and alliance members’ defense ministries.

Erdogan said Ankara not only fights terrorists who are hostile to the nation’s values and existence, but also those who unleashed them on Türkiye.

“In our state tradition, the army is an institution equipped with the nation’s values, serving as the cornerstone of the state and guaranteeing the country’s survival,” he added.

Source: Anadolu Agency

A mission from the UN’s nuclear watchdog arrived in the southern Zaporizhzhia city of Ukraine on Wednesday to inspect Europe’s largest nuclear power plant.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) team, headed by IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi, arrived in the city center of Zaporizhzhia, controlled by the Ukrainian army.

Speaking to reporters in a hotel, Grossi said the team will head to the power plant for inspections on Thursday.

He also added that “everything has been agreed” with the Russian side on the inspections.

Russia also confirmed the team’s arrival, with Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova telling reporters that Moscow was doing everything necessary to ensure that the IAEA mission reaches the plant safely.

Earlier in the day, the team had departed from Ukraine’s capital Kyiv for the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.

“We are finally moving after six months of strenuous efforts,” Grossi told reporters in Kyiv.

Grossi and his team arrived in Ukraine on Monday for inspections at the nuclear power plant, which has been under Russian control since March.

Fears of a nuclear catastrophe have grown as the area has been shelled multiple times in recent days, with Russia and Ukraine blaming each other.

Grossi said the team would “be spending a few days” at the facility.

“These are complex operations. We are going to a war zone … (and) occupied territory. This requires explicit guarantees, not only from Russia but also Ukraine, and we have been able to secure that,” he said.

The IAEA is also hoping to set up a permanent mission in Ukraine to monitor Zaporizhzhia power plant, he added.

*Writing by Ceyhun Alizade from Ankara

Source: Anadolu Agency

Bangladesh on Wednesday approved the import of 500,000 tons of wheat from Russia in order to stabilize the commodity’s price.

Additional Secretary of the Cabinet Division Abdul Barik announced the decision following a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Public Purchase in the capital Dhaka.

Bangladesh will pay Russia in US dollars for this wheat, he said, adding that wheat will be purchased at $430 per ton.

A Russian company was offered to handle the procurement, according to the official.

Earlier, the country’s Food Ministry met with Russian officials after the latter extended an offer to supply wheat and petrol to the south Asian nation. But, fearing US and Western sanctions over Russia’s military attack in Ukraine, Bangladesh did not rush to acquire the grain.

The purchase order for 230,000 metric tons of rice from India and Vietnam was also approved at the same meeting.

Source: Anadolu Agency

Canada’s gross domestic product (GDP) rose 3.3% in the second quarter of 2022, but failed to beat market estimates of a 4.5% expansion, Statistics Canada announced on Wednesday.

The second-quarter gain in the GDP implicit price index, which reflects the overall price of domestically produced goods and services, marked the largest jump since the third quarter of 1974, the statistics agency said in a statement.

Nominal GDP jumped 4.2% to reach $2.8 trillion in the second quarter, it added.

Real GDP rose 0.8% in April-June from January-March, marking the fourth consecutive quarterly rise.

This was driven by “increased business investment in inventories, non-residential structures, machinery and equipment, and household spending on services and semi-durable goods,” the agency said in a statement.

Growth in the second quarter, however, was “moderated by declines in housing investment and household spending on durable goods and by a rise in imports that exceeded exports,” it added.

In terms of trade, the ratio of the price of exports to the price of imports was up 5% in the second quarter, led by an 8.8% increase in export prices, primarily due to a 24.5% hike in the price of exported crude oil and crude bitumen, according to Statistics Canada.

Household incomes climbed in the second quarter due to higher compensation of employees, while government transfers to households fell 6.6% in the second quarter since government transfers declined as COVID-19 support ended.

Source: Anadolu Agency

Classified federal documents were likely “concealed and removed” from a storage room at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate in an effort to “obstruct” the ongoing federal information, according to the Justice Department.

A court document filed by the agency late Tuesday night said that over 100 classified records, including some materials marked with the highest level of US classification, were recovered from the ex-presidential residence when the FBI executed a search warrant on Aug. 8.

Obstruction of justice now appears to be the central thrust of the federal investigation, which was opened to probe Trump’s alleged removal of classified government documents from the White House as he left office in January 2021.

Revelations that the records were “likely concealed and removed from the Storage Room and that efforts were likely taken to obstruct the government’s investigation” come as part of the Justice Department’s efforts to oppose Trump’s motion to appoint an independent figure known as a “special master” to review the trove of confiscated documents.

The director of national intelligence is currently reviewing the materials to determine “the potential risk to national security that would result from the disclosure of these materials” to any third party.

Trump is seeking to have the special master review the documents to see whether any are covered under the principle of executive privilege, which is a presidential right to keep certain types of information secret, but critics call the move a stalling tactic in the face of growing legal woes.

District Judge Aileen Cannon said in an order on Saturday that she was inclined to approve the request for a special master ahead of a hearing she scheduled for Thursday.

The documents taken from Mar-a-Lago are the latest set retrieved from Trump’s residence. The National Archives and Records Administration retrieved 15 boxes, including 184 classified documents in January, and handed them over to the FBI as it referred the matter to the bureau.

During a June 3 visit to Mar-a-Lago by the FBI, Trump’s attorney handed documents over “in a manner that suggested counsel believed that the documents were classified: the production included a single Redweld envelope, double-wrapped in tape, containing the documents,” US Attorney for the Southern District of Florida Juan Antonio Gonzalez wrote in Tuesday’s filing.

An individual identified solely as a custodian presented a certification letter that stipulated “a diligent search” had been completed following a court-approved subpoena.

During the Aug. 8 search, however, FBI agents “in a matter of hours, recovered twice as many documents with classification markings as the ‘diligent search’ that the former President’s counsel and other representatives had weeks to perform,” Gonzalez wrote.

That, he said, “calls into serious question the representations made in the June 3 certification and casts doubt on the extent of cooperation in this matter.”

A photo included as part of the government’s filing depicts a trove of apparent government documents laid out on the floor, some of which are whited out, but others clearly show government markings indicating they classified information.

Source: Anadolu Agency

EU foreign ministers on Wednesday reached a political deal on suspending an EU-Russia visa facilitation agreement.

Speaking at a press conference after an informal meeting of top EU diplomats in the Czech capital Prague, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell announced that the diplomats greenlighted “full suspension” of the visa agreement with Russia.

The move will “significantly reduce the number of new visas issued by EU member states” to prevent Russians from “traveling for leisure and shopping as if no war was raging in Ukraine,” he stated.

At the same time, the member states will continue to process individual visa claims since “we do not want to cut ourselves (off) from the people who oppose the war in Ukraine, do not want to cut ourselves (off) from the Russian civil society,” Borrell stated.

He also explained that EU member states are allowed to take national measures, such as limiting the number of issued visas or restricting border crossings, as long as they respect EU law.

The top diplomats also invited the European Commission to work on guidelines on how to handle at the EU level the problem of already issued visas that may pose a security threat.

The ministers also agreed not to recognize Russian passports issued in occupied Ukrainian territories, Borrell added.

The political agreement on suspending the visa agreement puts an end to discussions of an EU-wide blanket ban on tourist visas originally proposed by Russia’s smaller Baltic neighbors Estonia, Latvia, and Finland but opposed by Germany and France.

Full suspension of the visa agreement comes after the EU partially halted the deal in February, mainly targeting government officials, diplomats, and businesspeople.

Since the meeting in Prague was informal, the ministers’ political agreement has yet to be turned into a legally binding, official one.

Source: Anadolu Agency

Moody’s raised the Turkish economy’s growth forecast for 2022 from 3.5% to 4.5%, according to the credit rating agency’s Global Macro Outlook 2022-23 Report August update released Wednesday.

“Strong credit impulse, policies supporting upward minimum wage adjustments and loose monetary policy have supported domestic consumption, while demand from trading partners and a weak lira have bolstered exports and tourism recoveries,” the report said.

The agency said it expects inflation in Türkiye to fall back to 70% by the end of this year, and to 40% by the end of next year, down from 80% for the 12 months ending in July.

The Turkish economy grew 7.6% in the second quarter of 2022 on an annual basis, according to Turkish Statistical Institute figures released earlier, making it the second-fastest growing economy in the G-20 after Saudi Arabia.

Moody’s noted that manufacturing activity is expanding in emerging market countries including Türkiye, Brazil, India, and Indonesia.

The rating agency lowered the growth forecast of G-20 economies to 2.5% for 2022 and 2.1% for 2023, citing “significant deterioration in the outlooks of several major economies since the start of the year.”

Previous projections made in May estimated G-20 economies to expand by 3.1% this year and 2.9% next year.

Among advanced G20 economies, the US is forecast to grow 1.9% and the euro area is estimated to expand 2.5% in 2022.

For emerging nations in the G-20, Russia’s economy is expected to contract 7% this year due to Ukraine war sanctions, while Saudi Arabia is projected to grow 7.2% due to an increase in its oil production and high oil prices benefiting its economy.

Source: Anadolu Agency

The US on Wednesday declined to respond directly to Turkish statements that Greece has increasingly harassed Turkish jets flying over international airspace, but did urge the two neighbors to “resolve (their) differences diplomatically.”

A State Department spokesperson who addressed the matter on condition of anonymity said the US is aware of the reports, and encouraged “our NATO allies Greece and Turkey to work together to maintain peace and security in the region.”

“We urge all parties to avoid rhetoric and actions that could further raise tensions,” the spokesperson said.

Turkish jets engaged in missions over the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean Seas on Aug. 23 were harassed by a Russian-made S-300 air defense system stationed on the Greek island of Crete, Turkish sources told Anadolu Agency earlier on Wednesday.

However, Greek military officials have denied the Turkish account of the actions, which are described as “hostile” in the NATO Rules of Engagement.

US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has spoken with his counterparts in Ankara and Athens “and emphasized the need for continued efforts to reduce tensions in the Aegean through constructive dialogue,” Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Garron Garn said in an email exchange.

Like the State Department, the Pentagon said it is aware of the Turkish statements.

Türkiye’s National Defense Ministry is preparing to send radar records of the incident to the NATO Secretariat-General and alliance members’ defense ministries.

Türkiye, a NATO member for over 70 years, has complained of repeated provocative actions and rhetoric by Greece in the region in recent months, saying such moves frustrate its good faith efforts for peace.

Since the beginning of 2022, Greek warplanes have violated Turkish airspace 256 times and harassed Turkish jets 158 times, according to Ankara.

Source: Anadolu Agency

The US struck a guarded note of optimism on Wednesday that it can reach an agreement with Iran on a mutual return to the landmark 2015 nuclear agreement.

“We still remain hopeful that we can get a reimplementation of the JCPOA,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters, using the formal acronym for the agreement. “We do believe we’re closer now than we have been in recent weeks and months, due in large part to Iran being willing to drop some of their demands that were not related to the deal at all.”

“We’re cautiously optimistic that the things can continue to move in the right direction,” he added.

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) saw an international inspections regime imposed on Tehran’s nuclear program in exchange for relief from biting international sanctions that hobbled Iran’s economy.

In 2018, then-President Donald Trump unilaterally left the agreement, bucking objections from all of the deal’s other participants, including close US allies in Europe, and reimposed US sanctions in a fruitless effort to bring Iran back to the negotiating table.

Instead, the Islamic republic took its own steps to ratchet up pressure on the deal’s international participants, including breaking limits it agreed to on key nuclear activities, including enrichment and the amount of enriched uranium it is allowed to possess.

Indirect talks between Iran and the US, mediated by the EU, concluded in Vienna earlier this month with a draft of the agreement being reached after over a year of negotiations.

The US said on Aug. 22 that Iran dropped its demand the US remove its Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) from a terror blacklist as part of the ongoing negotiations, removing a key stumbling block from the diplomatic talks.

Both the US and EU have submitted their responses to the EU’s proposal.

Source: Anadolu Agency