Reuters, Ankara
Iran and Turkey should prevent Iraq’s Kurdistan region from declaring independence, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Wednesday after meeting Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan in Tehran, state TV reported.
Relations have generally been cool between Shi’ite Iran and mainly Sunni Turkey, a NATO member. But both have been alarmed by the Iraqi Kurds’ vote for independence last month, fearing it will stoke separatism among their own Kurdish populations.
Turkey sentences 40 to life over Erdogan death plot
AFP, Istanbul
A Turkish court on Wednesday handed life sentences to 40 people convicted of plotting to assassinate President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at a luxury Aegean hotel during last year’s failed coup.
Thirty-one defendants, including senior military officers, were each given four life sentences at the trial in the southwestern city of Mugla, the private Dogan news agency reported.
Sarin traces in Syria attack: Watchdog
AP, The Hague
The global chemical weapons watchdog said Thursday it found traces of sarin following an attack in northern Syria in late March, days before a deadly strike using the same nerve agent in another Syrian town.
The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said that tests found traces of “sarin or sarin-related chemicals” in Ltamenah after a March 30 attack that injured 50 people. No deaths were reported. The organization didn’t release further details.
US Consulate employee arrested in Istanbul
AP, Ankara
Turkish authorities have arrested a U.S. Consulate employee in Istanbul over his alleged links to a movement led by U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, Turkey’s state-run news agency reported.
The U.S. Embassy said Thursday it believes the allegations against the staff member are “wholly without merit.”
