ISTANBUL
The Anadolu Agency does not verify these stories and does not vouch for their accuracy.
On Monday, the Turkish press mostly covered Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu’s remarks regarding the killing of three off-duty soldiers in the southeastern province of Hakkari. Five people were taken into custody in relation to Saturday’s killings.
“3-for-3 anger”, HURRIYET said. The paper reported Davutoglu’s reaction to remarks that the three Turkish troops had been killed in retaliation for the earlier deaths of three Kurdistan Workers’ Party militants in the eastern province of Kars.
VATAN ran the headline: “It will not work this way.” The paper quoted Davutoglu as saying: “The peace process will not work with the comparison of soldier with guerilla. Nobody can consider the state’s legitimate security forces and terrorists to be on the same level.”
The three soldiers were killed on Saturday afternoon by two masked men while they were in the center of Yuksekova dressed in civilian clothing, Interior Minister Efkan Ala told reporters on Saturday.
The daily also reported that a funeral ceremony was held in Hakkari for the soldiers where mothers of dead men lamented in Kurdish.
“Our attitude will change,” said Davutoglu, according to SABAH. The PM was speaking during a meeting with Ankara editors of national newspapers while en route to Kahramanmaras on Sunday.
The daily quoted Davutoglu as saying: “It is not possible for us to accept an argument such as ‘retaliation for the killing of three terrorists.' The peace process cannot go on this way. Otherwise our attitude will change.”
Similarly, MILLIYET also ran comments by Davutoglu on its front page: “Those who carried out this traitorous action will be punished.”
In other news, papers reported on the Sunday opening of a ‘Democracy and Development Museum’ which bears the name of Turkey’s ninth president, Suleyman Demirel. The museum is in Demirel’s home village of İslamköy near the western town of Isparta.
www.aa.com.tr/en
