NEWS SCAN for Turkey – June 7th, 2013
Down below you will find a summary of topics from major Turkish papers and internet sites.
Thousands greet PM Erdoğan at the airport on his return from North Africa
Prime Minister Erdoğan who returned to Turkey yesterday was greeted by thousands of supporters at Atatürk Int’l Airport. More than 10,000 supporters who wanted to show their solidarity with the PM over continuing Gezi Park protests against the government went to Yeşilköy where Erdoğan delivered a speech saying “These protests must come to an end as of now”.
“God is Great,” his supporters chanted with slogans referring to the protesters at Taksim Square. “Let us go, let us smash them,” they shouted. “Istanbul is here, where are the looters?”
Tens of thousands of protesters have been staging demonstrations in dozens of cities across Turkey, trigered by the police reaction last Friday to what started out as a small protest against a plan to develop Istanbul’s central Taksim Square. Many Protesters from all walks of life have shown reaction to Erdoğan’s increasingly autocratic and arrogant manner – charges.
Erdoğan says Turkey and Tunisia signs 21 new agreements
It was stated by Turkish Prime Minister that Turkey and Tunisia had established strong bilateral economic relations. Erdoğan who talked at the Turkish-Tunisian Business Forum said the economic relations among Turkey and Tunisia would be maintained under the secretaries of ministers of both countries and they were at the final stage of ending the custom duties between Turkey and Tunisia.
Erdogan said that trade volume among the two countries should rapidly rise to 3 billion USD from a billion. Compared to Erdogan’s statements, Tunisian Prime Minister Ali Laareydh pronounced the number “four” to increase the trading volume among the two countries. Erdogan stressed that Turkey was the second country at the construction sector after China in the world and Turkish companies, which have global experience at construction sector, should be involved in the superstructure projects in the next term in Tunisia.
Turkish PM also stated that Tunisia, with its intellectual young population, qualified workforce, strategic position opening to Africa, had opportunities as transit trade and logistics center and also Turkey had declared a 500 million USD financial support to Tunisia.
Turkish businessmen have 25 billion USD in the world
Turkish Minister of Economy Zafer Caglayan made a speech at the business forum in Tunisia where he said, “Turkish companies have a 744 million USD investment in Tunisia”.
Turkish businessmen have 25 billion USD in the world, and 6 billion of it is invested in Africa.”
Caglayan said that more investments would be made in Tunisia in the next term, and added, “We are ready to share our experience and fund of knowledge and also ready to open our trade markets to you.”
Tosyalı Group of Turkey invest in iron and steel facility in Algeria
Turkey’s mega iron-steel producers Tosyalı Holding which purchased one of the largest steel production facilities in Eastern Europe (Montenegro’s Zeljezara AD Niksic) last year have made a major investment in Algeria by building a plant in the Mediterranean town of Oran.
It is reported that the holding has spent 750 million dollars to establish the largest iron-steel factory in Algeria. Turkish PM Erdoğan opened the facility with the target annual revenue of one billion dollars. The factory is expected to provide employment opportunities for 1,000 people, as well.
After Gezi Park protests revenues of retail and entertainment sectors drop
It is reported that the retail and entertainment sectors in Turkey (and mainly Istanbul) have incurred serious losses in revenues based on the unrest prevailing in the country for the last 2 weeks
The members of the sector say they have suffered losses varying between 30 to 90 percent in their revenues due to the countrywide demonstrations.
They say the reason is some people rush to the main parks and squares in their city to support the Gezi Park protestors while others stay at home to watch events on screen. Obviously, this has led to retail stores, cinemas and restaurants suffering from a significant drop in income.
Number of cell phones in Turkey reaches 68 million
It is reported that the number of cell phone subscribers in Turkey has reached 67.9 million, while the number of 3G service subscribers has gone up to 43.9 million.
This information was released by Turkey’s Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK) in an Electronic Communications Sector Market Report. The report shows Türk Telekom and mobile operators brought in nearly 6.2 billion liras net sales revenue in the first three months of 2013. The amount of investment made by Türk Telekom and mobile operators was nearly 557 million liras during the months of January, February and March.
07.06.2013
SOURCE: MEDIA
We do not verify above stories neither do we vouch for their accuracy.
