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Tag: Turkey

  • Super Falcons kick off training in Turkey ahead of international friendlies

    Super Falcons kick off training in Turkey ahead of international friendlies

    Nigeria’s Super Falcons on Wednesday in Antalya had their first training session since arrival in Turkey on Tuesday ahead of the international friendlies against Haiti and New Zealand.

    Oluchi Tbechukwu, the senior women’s national football team’s Media Officer disclosed that most of the invited players have arrived in camp ahead of the matches.

    “We had our first training today at the Emir Sports Complex. It was a two-hour training and it was great to see all players in camp already.

    “The players are in high spirits and expectations are high as well.

    “We want to go into the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup with lots of confidence and winning against both teams will put us in the right frame,’’ Tobechukwu said.

    ALSO READ: See why Egyptian champions Zamalek fired its entire coaching staff

    The Super Falcons will face Haiti on Friday at the Emir Sports Complex before they lock horns with New Zealand at the Mardan Sports Complex on Tuesday.

    The matches are part of preparations ahead of the World Cup in Australia and New Zealand in July.

    ALSO READ: Feyenoord-Ajax rivalry marred by violence as Klaassen hit by thrown object

    Players present in camp include star forwards Asisat Oshoala and Desire Oparanozie, as well as goalkeepers Chiamaka Nnadozie, Inyene Etim, and Yewande Balogun.

    There are also defenders Onome Ebi, Glory Ogbonna, Tosin Demehin, Rofiat Imuran, and Ashleigh Plumptre, and midfielders Toni Payne, Christy Ucheibe, Ngozi Okobi-Okeoghene, Regina Otu, Deborah Abiodun, and Halimatu Ayinde.

    Forwards Esther Okoronkwo, Gift Monday, Rasheedat Ajibade, and new invitee Vivian Ikechukwu are joining Oshoala and Oparanozie in the battle for spaces in the frontline.

    Oshoala has not played for the nine-time African champions since the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations finals in Morocco nine months ago.

    Oparanozie is returning since the Aisha Buhari Cup Tournament in Lagos in September 2021.

    Only defender Michelle Alozie and forwards Jennifer Echegini and Uchenna Kanu, all U.S.-based, were still being expected as of Wednesday evening.

    April 6, 2023
  • 48,000 killed by earthquakes in Turkey, says President Erdogan

    48,000 killed by earthquakes in Turkey, says President Erdogan

     

    Turkish President Recep Erdogan, on Sunday, said the number of people killed by the devastating earthquakes in Turkey’s SouthEast has reached 48,000, with over 115,000 people injured

    “The death toll has reached 48,000 and the number of injured has exceeded 115,000,” Erdogan said in a televised address to the nation from the Samandag district of Hatay province.

    It will be recalled that on February 6, two earthquakes of magnitude 7.7 and 7.6 hit the southeastern regions of Turkey with an interval of nine hours.

    Thousands of underground shocks that followed were felt in 11 Turkish provinces, as well as in the neighbouring countries, of which Syria was the most affected.

    NAN

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  • Turkey quake fuels conspiracy posts on US antenna station

    Turkey quake fuels conspiracy posts on US antenna station

    Scientists have for years been refuting claims that the High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program, with its Alaska facility boasting 180 radio antennae, is a US government-backed programme to weaponise the atmosphere and subjugate the population.

    The series of earthquakes that struck Turkey and Syria on February 6, killing tens of thousands of people, gave rise to a new variant of the theory on social media in various languages.

    It has been dismissed by experts as science fiction.

    – ‘Crazy’ earthquake claims –

    Some users cited flashes of light before the quake as evidence they were artificially generated by HAARP.

    Some claimed it was to punish Turkey for resisting the admission of new member countries to NATO.

    “This is so crazy. It’s like asking if the earthquake was caused by Bugs Bunny digging for carrots,” said David Keith, professor of applied physics at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

    “There is simply no known mechanism for anything remotely like HAARP to have any impact on earthquakes.”

    HAARP sends radio waves to heat electrons in the ionosphere, the top layer of Earth’s atmosphere, to study their effects on communications systems.

    Its waves are not big enough to reach Turkey.

    Quakes are caused by movements of the Earth’s crust.

    Experts told AFP lights are commonly seen during earthquakes.

    Theories vary about their origin. In some cases, they come from power lines or electricity stations shaken by the quake.

    HAARP was run by the United States Air Force and Navy before being handed over in 2015 to the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

    Michael Lockwood, professor of space environment physics at the University of Reading, said claims about HAARP being used as a weapon may have stemmed from the programme initially using radio waves to communicate with submarines — a function that became obsolete after the Cold War.

    This history “got blown up into the farcical idea that HAARP is some form of a weapon”, Lockwood said.

    “Some form of social mind control is the usual favourite but generating earthquakes is one that I hadn’t heard before.”

    – Climate change theories –

    Numerous social media posts have claimed HAARP is used to engineer storms and heatwaves.

    Some recent ones suggested the aim is to create climate change so that authorities can restrict people’s activities or even reduce the population.

    Some cited a patent for a proposed device to heat parts of the ionosphere for defence purposes.

    Filed in 1985 at the height of the Cold War, the document claims the technology could be used for “missile or aircraft destruction” or “weather modification”.

    But the patent has since expired and there is no evidence the technology in it was developed.

    HAARP’s transmitters send radio waves from 80 kilometres to more than 500 km (50-310 miles) above the Earth’s surface — far too high for such signals to affect weather or climate.

    “The idea that technology can somehow bring about these extreme events makes no sense,” Ella Gilbert, a meteorologist at the British Antarctic Survey, told AFP.

    “It is technically extremely difficult to influence such a large, complex and chaotic system as the weather.”

    – False Covid connection –

    Other posts claim signals from HAARP can hit Earth, disrupting communications and power, and even harming people’s health.

    David Hysell, a professor of earth and atmospheric sciences at Cornell University, said HAARP was no more dangerous than any other electrical or radio station.

    Researchers have identified similarities between the HAARP claims and a wave of conspiracy theories about 5G telecommunications that emerged during the Covid pandemic.

    Millions of people viewed Facebook posts claiming to show spacecraft from HAARP “emitting 5G radiation which contains the coronavirus”.

    The posts showed a photo of a flying object leaving contrails. An analysis by AFP Fact Check indicated the photo was a montage.

    “I don’t know where the conspiracy theories surrounding HAARP come from,” said Hysell.

    “I think people confuse the research purpose of HAARP, which is to study naturally occurring hazards in space, with the operations of the facility itself.”

    AFP

  • Bodies of Cyprus students killed in Turkey quake flown home

    Bodies of Cyprus students killed in Turkey quake flown home

    The bodies of seven Cypriot students killed in the powerful earthquake that hit Turkey have been returned home, with Turkish media reporting that 19 children in the group died.

    Two dozen children aged 11 to 14 from the island, along with 10 parents, four teachers and a volleyball coach, were in the southern Turkish city of Adiyaman when Monday’s quake hit.

    The 7.8-magnitude tremor, whose epicentre was near Gaziantep, about 130 kilometres (80 miles) southwest of Adiyaman, has claimed the lives of more than 21,000 people in Turkey and Syria.

    The children had been taking part in a school volleyball tournament and had been staying in a hotel in Adiyaman that was completely destroyed by the quake.

    “The bodies of 19 students have been found under the rubble,” a correspondent for Turkey’s NTV channel said.

    A plane arrived in Cyprus the early hours of Friday with the bodies of the seven children as well as two teachers and a parent, local TV images showed.

    Turkish Cypriot leader Ersin Tatar welcomed the bodies accompanied by other government and military officials of the breakaway Turkish Cypriot statelet of northern Cyprus.

    Officials on Friday confirmed 16 members of the group had died.

    The tragedy has devastated the small breakaway statelet on the Mediterranean island of 270,000 residents.

    The region’s government had declared a national mobilisation, hiring a private plane so they could join the search-and-rescue effort for the children.

  • Turkey president faces voter fury after earthquake

    Turkey president faces voter fury after earthquake

    The earthquake that killed more than 21,000 people across Turkey and Syria came at one of the most politically sensitive moments of Erdogan’s two-decade rule.

    The Turkish leader has proposed holding a crunch election on May 14 that could keep his Islamic-rooted government in power until 2028.

    The date gives his splintered opposition little time to hammer out their differences and agree on a joint presidential candidate.

    Whether that vote can now go ahead as planned remains to be seen.

    Erdogan has declared a three-month state of emergency across 10 quake-hit provinces. The region is still digging out its dead and many are living on the streets or in their cars.

    Campaigning here seems out of the question.

    But there is also a political dimension that is deeply personal for Erdogan.

    The earthquake struck just as he was gaining momentum and starting to lift his approval numbers from a low suffered during a dire economic crisis that exploded last year.

    Tanriverdi’s bitterness is a bad sign for Erdogan in a province where he handily beat his secular opposition rival in the last election in 2018.

    “We were deeply hurt that no one supported us,” Tanriverdi said of the government’s earthquake response.

    – Erdogan fights back –

    Tanriverdi’s grievances are common in Adiyaman province — one of the hardest-hit by the quake.

    Locals complain that rescuers didn’t arrive in time to pull out people who survived the first critical hours. Some pointed to a lack of machinery to drill through slabs of concrete.

    “I did not see anyone until 2:00 pm on the second day of the earthquake,” Adiyaman resident Mehmet Yildirim said.

    “No government, no state, no police, no soldiers. Shame on you! You left us on our own.”

    Erdogan admitted “shortcomings” in the government’s handling of the disaster on Wednesday.

    But he is also fighting back. The 68-year-old led a rescue response meeting in Ankara on Tuesday and spent the following two days touring a series of devastated cities.

    He is yet to visit Adiyaman.

    That upsets Hediye Kalkan, a volunteer who travelled nearly 150 kilometres (95 miles) to help with the Adiyaman rescue and recovery effort.

    “Why doesn’t the state show itself on a day like this?” she demanded.

    “People are taking their relatives’ bodies out by their own means”.

    – ‘Isn’t it a sin?’ –

    The sheer scale and timing of the disaster — spanning a large and remote region in the middle of a winter storm — would make any rescue effort complicated.

    Erdogan has received a largely warm reception from locals in carefully choreographed visits broadcast on national television.

    One elderly woman came out to hug Erdogan and shed tears on his shoulder.

    Veysel Gultekin might not do the same if he had a chance to face the Turkish leader.

    Gultekin said he had seen one of his relatives’ feet trapped under the rubble after running out on the street after Monday’s pre-dawn tremor.

    “If I had a simple drill, I could have pulled him out alive,” Gultekin said. “But he was completely trapped and after a strong aftershock, he died.”

    AFP reporters saw more machines and rescue workers — including international teams — around collapsed buildings on Thursday.

    But this was not enough to soothe Tanriverdi’s pain.

    “People who didn’t die from the earthquake were left to die in the cold,” he said. “Isn’t it a sin, people who have been left to die like this?”

    AFP

  • Turkey, Syria quake could affect 23 million people – WHO

    Turkey, Syria quake could affect 23 million people – WHO

    Up to 23 million people could be affected by the massive earthquake that has killed thousands in Turkey and Syria, the WHO warned on Tuesday, promising long-term assistance.

    “Event overview maps show that potentially 23 million people are exposed, including around five million vulnerable populations,” the World Health Organization’s senior emergencies officer Adelheid Marschang said.

    “Civilian infrastructure and potentially health infrastructure have been damaged across the affected region, mainly in Turkey and northwest Syria,” she said.

    The WHO “considers that the main unmet needs may be in Syria in the immediate and mid-term,” Marschang told the WHO’s executive committee in Geneva.

    She spoke as rescuers in Turkey and Syria braved freezing cold, aftershocks and collapsing buildings, as they dug for survivors buried by a string of earthquakes that killed more than 5,000 people.

    “It is now a race against time,” said WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, explaining that the UN health agency was urgently sending aid to the area.

    “We’re mobilising emergency supplies and we have activated the WHO network of emergency medical teams to provide essential health care for the injured and most vulnerable.”

    Disaster agencies said several thousand buildings were flattened in cities across a vast Turkey-Syria border region — pouring misery on an area already plagued by war, insurgency, refugee crises and a recent cholera outbreak.

    Through the night, survivors used their bare hands to pick over the twisted ruins of multi-storey apartment blocks — trying to save family, friends and anyone else sleeping inside when the first massive 7.8-magnitude quake struck early Monday.

    The situation is particularly dire in northern Syria, which has already been decimated by years of war.

    “The movement of aid through the border into northwest Syria is likely to be or is already disrupted due to the damage caused by the earthquake,” Marschang said.

    “This in itself would be a huge crisis already.”

    She addressed a special meeting on the tragedy, which held a minute’s silence for the victims.

    The WHO chief vowed that the agency would “work closely with all partners to support authorities in both countries in the critical hours and days ahead, and in the months and years to come as both countries recover and rebuild.”

    (AFP)

  • Earthquake: Nigerian students in Turkey undergoing post-trauma analysis, says NANS

    Earthquake: Nigerian students in Turkey undergoing post-trauma analysis, says NANS

    Deborah Tolu-Kolawole

    The National Association of Nigerian Students in Turkey has said that Nigerian students who were traumatised as a result of the Monday 7.8 magnitude earthquake that hit the country have been taken in by Turkish officials for post-trauma analysis.

    The earthquake, which has so far claimed thousands of lives, brought down whole apartment blocks in Turkish cities and plied more devastation on millions of Syrians displaced by years of war.

    The president of NANS Turkish zone, Yakubu Sabo, who spoke with our correspondent on Tuesday, said some Nigerian students were traumatised and were undergoing post-trauma analysis, adding that they would be released once they were certified okay.

    Sabo said, “Turkey is an earthquake-prone area. Some of our new students were traumatised and have been taken in for post-shock analysis. They will be released as soon as they are certified okay. The old students are already used to it. We will provide more updates along the line”.

    According to The Time, earthquakes are not uncommon in Turkey. The country is situated on the Anatolian plate which borders two major fault lines; the North Anatolian fault, which stretches across the country from west to east, and the East Anatolian fault, which is in eastern Turkey.

    The former has been the site of several disastrous earthquakes, according to the Geological Society of London, including the 1939 earthquake in north-eastern Turkey that resulted in the deaths of 30,000 people.

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  • No Nigerian died in Turkey earthquake – Group

    No Nigerian died in Turkey earthquake – Group

    Although there was information that some Africans might have been affected by the earthquake in Turkey, there had been no information yet about any Nigerian casualty, the Vice President of the Nigerian Community in Turkey, Enifoma Ubogu, said on Tuesday.

    According to him, the Nigerian community was trying to send help, including “20 able-bodied men” to help in recovery efforts with the Turkish authorities.

    A huge earthquake on Monday killed thousands of people across a swathe of Turkey.

    The magnitude 7.8 quake brought down whole apartment blocks in Turkish cities, described as the worst tremor to strike Turkey in the 21st century.

    The death toll, according to Vice President Fuat Oktay, stood at 1,541.

    In Diyarbakir in South East Turkey, a woman speaking next to the wreckage of the seven-storey block where she lived said, “We were shaken like a cradle. There were nine of us at home. Two sons of mine are still in the rubble, I’m waiting for them.”

    She was nursing a broken arm and had injuries to her face.

    Ubogu in an interview with The PUNCH from Istanbul, said it was a sad development.

    He said, “Hello Brother, Good morning. Yes, it’s a very sad one here in Turkey. The earthquake really destroyed things. We have information that some Africans might have been affected, but we don’t know directly if there was any Nigerian affected at this moment.

    “Another thing is that most of the Nigerians live in Istanbul and other parts. Hatay is a place where Africans live as well and it was affected, but we have no independent confirmation whether there’s any Nigerian that has been badly affected by the earthquake.

    He added that the community was planning to send “20 able-bodied men” to help the Turkish authorities in their efforts to rescue those trapped in the rubbles.

    “But just for your information, as a community here, we are trying to organise to see how we can send help as well. We are planning to send as many as 20 able-bodied men to help in recovery efforts with the Turkish authorities.

    “Turkey is located in the earthquake zone, and so, it’s a common occurrence here. Before now, there have been quite number of tremors, even in Istanbul. Personally, I have experienced it, you just feel the house shaking, like somebody is trying to remove the carpet under your leg. So, everybody knows that this is a possibility in Turkey and unfortunately, there is really no remedy against these natural events. It is just for us to be prayerful and spiritual.

    “At the moment, it’s not in Istanbul and most of the Nigerians are in Istanbul,” he added.

  • TV preacher bags 8,658 years imprisonment in Turkey

    TV preacher bags 8,658 years imprisonment in Turkey

    An Istanbul court, on Wednesday, sentenced a Muslim televangelist who surrounded himself with scantily clad women he called “kittens” to 8,658 years in prison in a retrial, local media reported.

    Adnan Oktar led television programmes surrounded by women wearing lots of makeup and little clothes as he preached creationism and conservative values.

    Last year, the 66-year-old was sentenced to 1,075 years for crimes including sexual assault, sexual abuse of minors, fraud and attempted political and military espionage.

    But that ruling was overturned by an upper court.

    During the retrial, Istanbul high criminal court sentenced Oktar to 8,658 years in prison on several charges including sexual abuse and depriving someone of their liberty, the Anadolu news agency reported.

    The court also sentenced 10 other suspects to 8,658 years in prison each, the agency said.

    Oktar, whom critics see as the leader of a cult, gained notoriety for his programmes on the online A9 television channel and had regularly been denounced by Turkey’s religious leaders.

    In a major crackdown on his group, he was taken into custody in Istanbul in 2018 as part of a probe by the city’s police financial crimes unit.

    AFP

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  • Govt looks to China, Portugal, Turkey for loans to complete rail projects

    Govt looks to China, Portugal, Turkey for loans to complete rail projects

    N10.78tr Budget deficit

    The Minister of Transportation, Mu’azu Jaji Sambo, said yesterday that the Federal Government hoped to complete the ongoing rail projects across the country with multi-billion dollar loans from financial institutions based in China, Portugal and Turkey.

    Sambo disclosed this when he appeared before the Joint National Assembly Committee on Land and Marine Transport, chaired by Senator Danjuma Goje to defend the 2023 budget of the ministry.

    He explained that the Ministry was committed to the implementation of the Nigeria Railway Modernization project.

    He said the railway network was being progressively expanded through yearly budgetary appropriations since the Federal Government was facing challenges in securing counterpart funding through loans.

    Sambo said: “Currently, the implementation of the Kaduna-Kano, Port Harcourt to Maiduguri and Kano – Maradi segments of the Railway Modernization is ongoing with the Federal Government counterpart funding in the 2022 appropriation.

    “The Ministry hopes that the Federal Ministry of Finance concludes negotiation of the loans with infrastructure development finance institutions of Chinese, Portuguese and Turkish origin to implement the projects.

    “To ensure finalising and signing of the loan agreements, evidence of source of funding of the balance of the advance payment and other aspects of work to be financed directly by the Federal Government has to be made available to these financial institutions through adequate budgetary provisions in the year 2023 budget and subsequent budgets.”

    He also said the Lagos – Ibadan segment of the Lagos – Kano and Itakpe to Warri railway projects were fully operational and receiving patronage from the general public.

    To reach practical completion on the projects, the Minister said some aspects of works, including construction of overpass bridges, connection to the national grid and other ancillary provisions had to be completed.

    The Minister said: “Adequate funds need to be provided in the 2023 budget to facilitate the practical completion of the projects.

    The Minister lamented the sad occurrence on the Abuja – Kaduna Rail incident earlier in the year and said plans were ongoing to resume service there.

    “With the release of those abducted, the Ministry plans to commence operation on the line, but not without taking proper precaution,” he said.

    He explained that necessary security gadgets would be installed to monitor the line and forestall a reoccurrence.

    He expressed the hope that members of the National Assembly would assist the Ministry in achieving the plan.

    He told the lawmakers that his ministry had proposed a total capital budget of N92, 251,422,746 and overhead of N382,185, 472

    He added that the total capital appropriation of the Ministry for 2022 was N147, 549,080,677 out of which N52,134,727,253.22 representing 35.33per cent had been released to date.

    He said N38,904,208,345 had been utilised as of 25 October, 2022. He said N358, 799,998 was appropriated for Overhead expenditure out of which N209, 299,998.81 was released.

    He said the sum of N180, 623,089.34 of the released amount was expended as at 25th October, 2022.

    The Chairman of the Joint National Assembly Committee on Land and Marine Transport, Senator Goje, expressed concern over the extension of the implementation of the capital component of the yearly budget beyond each fiscal year.

    Goje said: “The extension of the implementation of the capital component of the annual budget by three months, had defeated the success recorded by the 9th National Assembly to reverse the country’s budget cycle from January to December.”