news

Turkish police seize opposition HQ in Istanbul:

Riot police stormed the Istanbul headquarters of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) on 8 September, forcing entry after hours of clashes to escort court-appointed interim chief Gursel Tekin inside.

The Istanbul 45th Civil Court of First Instance had dismissed provincial head Ozgur Celik last week, ruling that delegate votes in the party’s 2023 provincial congress were influenced by alleged bribery.

The court threw out the elected board and named former CHP deputy chair Tekin as interim provincial head, a decision rejected by both Celik and CHP headquarters.

Tekin, who earlier said he would not enter the headquarters with police, requested riot police support after both the CHP headquarters and Celik rejected his appointment.

He arrived to find the building barricaded and occupied by party members, including MPs.

Riot police used pepper spray and shields to disperse demonstrators, with CHP member Suat Ozcagdas telling Halk TV that officers fired tear gas “inch by inch” as they moved floor by floor inside the building.

“There are elderly people and people with asthma. On every floor they enter with gas. This is a human rights violation,” he said.

Protests began on Sunday, when the CHP called on Istanbul residents to gather outside its offices after police cordoned off the site.

Earlier on Monday, several political influencers who had voiced support for the protests were detained.

Internet watchdogs reported bandwidth throttling that slowed access to social media platforms.

The CHP denounced the takeover as a “siege.”

In a separate interview with the Financial Times (FT), party leader Ozgur Ozel accused the government of staging “a coup against the future ruling party.”

“They are trying to take over the party that won the last election, was the founding party of the Turkish republic, is the party leading every poll … We’re facing an authoritarian government and … the only option is to resist,” he said.

In Istanbul, Tekin claimed those resisting him “were not CHP members.”

“Nothing can stop us, even if they shoot us,” he said, insisting he would not back down, after a water bottle was thrown at him as he attempted a press statement.

The party’s general headquarters later announced it would close its provincial branch headquarters and operate from another location until a new Istanbul congress is held.

The Istanbul decision has drawn attention to a separate lawsuit in Ankara, scheduled for 15 September, which could annul the results of the CHP’s 38th Ordinary Congress in 2023 and unseat Ozel.

Since October 2024, more than 500 CHP members and officials have been detained nationwide, according to state disclosures reviewed by Reuters in July.

The arrests have included Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu, who is Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s main rival, and 16 CHP mayors accused of corruption. CHP figures have described the campaign as a political operation to dismantle the party after its victories in last year’s local elections.

apparently I managed to post these a couple of hours right before the last thread ended:

• Government Accountability Office on the F-35

• Government Accountability Office on aircraft mission readiness

Milei suffers major setback in bellwether vote

With 91% of polling stations reporting, Fuerza Patria has 47% of vote against nearly 34% for Milei's ruling La Libertad Avanza.

President Javier Milei vowed Sunday to "accelerate" his libertarian reforms after a crushing defeat in elections in Buenos Aires Province. The regional vote carries significant weight and comes ahead of highly anticipated midterms on October 26.

The 54-year-old economist has slashed public spending, dismissed tens of thousands of public employees and led a major deregulation drive since taking office in December 2023. He acknowledged his party's "clear defeat" by the centre-left Peronist movement in the elections to the legislature of Buenos Aires Province, the country's economic powerhouse.

A deflated-sounding Milei admitted to unspecified "mistakes" which he vowed to "correct" but said he would not be swayed "one millimetre" from his reform agenda. “Not only will we continue on the same course, but we will deepen and accelerate it,” he said at a muted election night event in the resort of La Plata, where he took the stage in silence, in marked contrast to his usual dramatic entrance to rock music.

Most of his officials left the headquarters as soon as the President finished speaking, without making any statements to the press. With 91 percent of the votes counted, the centre-left Fuerza Patria coalition had taken over 47 percent of the vote against nearly 34 percent for Milei's ruling La Libertad Avanza, official results showed. The 13-point gap between Milei's party and the left was far greater than opinion polls had predicted. Turnout in the election was high, at around 63 percent.

Elections in Buenos Aires Province are telling as a bellwether for Argentina. The region contributes more than 30 percent of Argentina's GDP and accounts for 40 percent of all eligible voters. The election renewed 23 Senate seats and 46 banks in the provincial legislature. The result poses major concerns for Milei, coming just six weeks before midterm elections. Some members of his party downplayed the extent of the defeat, pointing out that La Libertad Avanza had nonetheless increased its share of legislators in Buenos Aires Province.

The government went into the election under a cloud following a corruption scandal at the ANDIS national disability agency involving the president's sister and right-hand woman, Karina Milei.

In a sign of the anger among many Argentines over the affair, Milei and his sister were pelted with stones on the campaign trail in late August, with skirmishes breaking out among supporters and opponents. Karina Milei, who has not defended herself publicly, voted at around noon and left surrounded by supporters, without making any statements to the press. The ruling party's election drubbing comes three days after Milei suffered a major setback when Congress overturned his veto of a law increasing allowances for disabled people.

Disabled people bad, according to the ancaps. Straight up nazi shit.

On the economic front, the self-described "anarcho-capitalist" is struggling also, despite success in fighting inflation and in erasing a fiscal deficit. Last week, his government began selling treasury dollars to stem the depreciation of the currency, the peso, which had been accelerating in recent weeks despite high interest rates.

"We must learn from this” [election defeat], La Libertad Avanza candidate Diego Valenzuela told AFP, claiming that the result "was due to not engaging in economic populism, which is new in Argentina." His remarks were aimed at the Peronists, accused by Milei of leading South America's second-biggest economy to ruin through excessive spending and protectionism. Milei's party absorbed former president Mauricio Macri's (2015-19) PRO party for the elections, while Peronism secured hard-fought unity despite multiple internal rifts.

Electoralism sucks for sure but it's still good the see the ancaps lose regardless. Their handling of the economy is, to say the least, not very good and that has a direct impact on a lot of working class people in the Province of Buenos Aires, which almost by default is a Peronist stronghold... and now it's gotten even bigger.

Still unclear what's going to happen. I do wish milei gets to purge her own sister from the party because of that corruption scandal lmfao, that would be absolute cinema. However, it is very likely that he'll do a minor purge, some "reshuffling" along internal lines and go back at it with full austerity until the general elections in 2027. Perhaps they'll put the entire economic model on overdrive to see if they can make it that far, but it'll end up crashing anyways, Macri did that to secure a win in the elections in the past and not only lost the electoral process but he also crashed the economy lmfao.

Meanwhile the Trots got around 5% of the votes, solid third place all things considered. Not a terrible result for a party that: Doesn't really care about electoralism, does politics in a heavily Peronist region, does politics without any kind of media support and campaign funds are acquired completely from internal backers, which is, their own militancy. They secured two seats.

Also, look at this loser lmao

Dresses like shit, looks like shit and probably smells like shit too. HOW MANY LAYERS OF CLOTHING DO YOU NEED? It wasn't even that cold last night lmao

https://t.me/kalibrated/23989

General Gerasimov turned 70 years old today, the age limit for high ranking officers in the Russian Armed Forces, and Putin reportedly awarded him the Order of Courage. There's a good chance he will retire and be replaced.

The timing is kind of a weird coincidence. Trump's 50 day sanctions deadline just expired, Russia and Ukraine are getting more aggressive with their missile strikes, and the "hot phase" of the Zapad military exercises in Belarus is beginning this weekend.

this comment was first as of the time of this writing

Ok, so what do we think happens with the flotilla? It's far too large for Israel to just board every ship and arrest everyone in such a simple fashion as they did with the last two single-ship attempts. It has mass support across the Mediterranean, including the direct promise of Italian dockworkers to "shut down Europe". I don't think they can actually do that, but they certainly could shut down a lot of Italy and disrupt a ton of Mediterranean trade, but only 2 or the sea's biggest 10 ports are in Italy. I also don't think Israel will just blow the entire fleet out of the water, but if they did, what happens? That would have to prompt a massive new wave of action across the region, right?

Our friends in Palestine are really struggling right now, our comrade @mahmoud@hexbear.net tried to raise money to relocate his family to Southern Gaza and only got $60 in the last week.

They need a tent and as we know the conditions in North Gaza are really dire right now.

I've donated and I think we can really make a difference for our friends.

Please send help if you can:

https://gofund.me/5156f6e9

Can anyone fill me in on the implications on the Murdoch deal I’m too busy to look into it

Sounds to me like the son who wants to keep news corp super conservative won out? So now there won’t be drama when the old fucker croaks and nothing will happen?

First norwegian election results are in: *Succdem-led block on top with a lead of ~9 mandates *Fascist party second largest party with ~24% of votes counted

Hezbollah doesn’t seem to be going anywhere

https://en.al-akhbar.com/news/hezbollah-steps-in-with--3-billion-reconstruction-plan-as-st

https://thecradle.co/articles/hezbollah-readies-large-scale-reconstruction-plan-for-lebanon-report

In Burkina faso/west Africa news, here's a short piece from a mining trade magazine on traore's nationalization of gold mines. There isn't any deep geopolitical analysis here but there is some specific mines/ companies and values if people are interested.

What is more notable to me is the tenor of comments. The article is typical neocolonial investor centric press, but 80% or so of the comments are broadly in favour of resource nationalism and Burkina faso's general approach.

https://archive.is/tcXSx

With gold at $3k/oz+, these are valuable assets.