ISTANBUL (AP) – Turkish opposition members and human rights defenders are urging President Donald Trump to raise the issue of Turkey’s deteriorating human rights and democracy in talks with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday.
Erdogan is scheduled to meet with Trump at the White House for discussions expected to center on the friction between the two NATO allies over a U.S. decision to arm Syrian Kurdish fighters considered as terrorists by Turkey. They will also likely focus on a Turkish request for the extradition of a U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen whom Turkey blames for last summer’s failed coup.
The Trump administration has placed priority on U.S. security issues and advancing foreign policy goals, and there is no indication that the issues of human rights and media freedoms will figure prominently on the agenda.
The meeting comes weeks after Erdogan’s narrow victory in a national referendum that will expand the powers of his office – a development critics say takes Turkey closer toward autocratic rule.
“Turkey is under a state of emergency since (the failed coup), during which human rights have been trampled on,” said Sezgin Tanrikulu, a legislator from Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party, or CHP. “The media and press freedoms have been placed under government control. Torture and ill-treatment have increased.”