Interior Minister accuses Western countries of staging psychological warfare against Türkiye

ANKARA

Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu has harshly criticized some prominent Western countries, including the United States, for closing their consulates and other missions in Istanbul over terror threat, accusing them of staging a psychological warfare against Türkiye.

“On the day when we announced our target to attract 60 million tourists annually, they have started a psychological warfare against Türkiye over [a terror attack by] the DAESH,” Soylu said at a meeting on Feb. 2, referring to the decision by the embassies of the U.S., Germany, Netherlands, United Kingdom and Belgium to temporarily close down their general-consulates in Istanbul.

The first move came last week from the U.S. Embassy which announced that they suspend the functions of the consulate in Istanbul due to a significant intelligence that foreign missions and religious, touristic spots foreigners highly visit may be targeted by terrorists. Other western consulates followed the U.S. move.

Soylu recalled that the same embassies tried hard for the release of Osman Kavala in 2021 and signed a petition to this end. The minister accused the same ambassador of trying to execute a terror operation against Türkiye after their unsuccessful attempt to release Kavala.

The ambassadors of the U.S., Germany, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and Sweden have released a joint statement which called the Turkish government to resolve the matter quickly and release him in line with the verdicts of the European Court of Human Rights.

Soylu separately slammed the U.S. for its ongoing partnership with the YPG which is accused of holding the deadly terror attack in October in downtown Istanbul. “Don’t we know that you are hand in hand with those behind the attack on the Istiklal Avenue? If it would be us who did so, we would have already been tagged as the state of terror,” he said.