News archive of January 2017

How many of us see it this way I have no idea but I tend to believe that there ought to be at least two different forms of apocalypse: One is concerning humanity and the other is a very individual one. Which is bigger? Of course the closer the apocalypse is, it gets bigger and the biggest ought to be the individual one…

Global opinion leaders and observers of politics all agree that 2016 was a "terrible year." All have good reasons to complain: American liberals suffered from their grave presidential election defeat, British liberals suffered from the Brexit vote, and European liberals worry about the rise of the far right.

The main message of 2016 was that we are entering a period of economic and political upheaval comparable to the industrial revolution of 1780-1850, and nothing expressed that message more clearly than Donald Trump's appointment of Andrew Puzder as Secretary of Labor.

Even though it's clear that neither man understands the message.

At least 39 people were killed in an attack at the Reina nightclub in Turkey early on Sunday, authorities say.

Sixty-nine were injured (eight of them critically) by the attacker who entered the popular club and started raving through the crowd, Hürriyet Daily News quotes Istanbul Governor Vasip Şahin as saying.

An earthquake measuring 4.8 on the Richter scale hit a sea area located 57 kilometers northeast of the Dodecanese island of Kasos on Sunday afternoon, according to the Athens Geodynamic Institute.

The tremor's epicenter was located at a depth of 10 kilometers under the seabed, the institute added.

The Education Ministry is gearing up for a curriculum renewal project for all education units in Turkey, claiming to focus on simplifying content while increasing students' analytical skills. 

An Education Ministry undersecretary said on Dec. 31 that he was threatened not to accept the promotion that brought him to his current post back in 2013 by a minister of the time, who added that if he did accept the promotion he would be "humiliated."

The Kurdish issue-focused Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) on Jan. 1 condemned the armed attack that targeted New Year revelers at a nightclub in central Istanbul, claiming 39 lives and wounding more than 60 people.

The HDP said it "cursed this inhumane attack," while also criticizing the Directorate of Religious Affairs' (Diyanet) Friday sermon on Dec. 30.

No country is safe from terror incidents, Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said on Jan. 1 after the deadly terror attack on an Istanbul nightclub that killed 39 people and wounded more than 60.

Turkey detained a staff journalist for The Wall Street Journal for almost three days without access to a lawyer, the newspaper reported on Dec. 31, adding to growing concerns over press freedom in the country.