In recent years, Turkey has been among the largest buyers of UK arms, with over £800 million worth of military equipment having been licensed to the regime. UK government information (available from the CAAT website) shows that these licences include components for military helicopters, missiles and military vehicles. In 2017 Theresa May became the first Western leader to visit President Erdogan since the crackdown began. She left having negotiated an agreement for the UK’s biggest arms company, BAE Systems, to support a £100 million fighter jet deal. The F-16 fighter planes used by Turkey to bomb Afrin include laser targeting systems produced by Leonardo in Edinburgh.

That Erdogan fella is just evil, threatening Europe. It's just unbelievable, they are the second biggest army in NATO, according to BBC4 News

As a Greek I was brought up to believe that Turks, with the exception of one girl on here who is a real doll, are a bunch of A-holes.

Yes I saw his threat to Europe to open the gates to 3.6 million immigrants..

There was even rumors in German newspapers last year, that he blackmailed the EU, demanding financial support for keeping refugees ... and he got the money

Wouldn't surprise me in the least..

We have a huge population of Turks in Germany. Never mind the older generation, those who came in the 1950s and 60s, they well blended in. But the younger generation? Staging mass ralleys to support that rat

It's a crazy world

Not even talking about the failed military coup in 2016. For me it was staged, so Erdogan had an excuse to hit out at the opposition, and put himself into absolute power

Seems to me like the Kurds have always been threw to the wolves after doing everyone elses dirty work..

The state of Turkey, as we know it now, was only founded in 1923. One Third of the country, the south east, was originally Kurdish land.

https//www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-29702440

Copied from a friend..

For anyone with no understanding of what's happening to Kurds right now, here's a little (simplified) history lesson for you....

Kurds have been living on the land they call home now for thousands of years. After WW1 and the fall off the Ottoman Empire, the British and French promised Kurds they could continue to reside in those areas peacefully because they intended to create a country called Kurdistan. They went back on that promise and split the Kurdish homeland into four with the creation of Iraq, Iran, Turkey, and Syria.

All four of those countries have persecuted their Kurdish populations ever since. Turkey has committed the worst atrocities during that time, and up until recently, the Kurdish language, Kurdish names, and more were all banned. Turkey even refuses to call the people Kurds, and refers to them as "Mountain Turks" - a slur designed to brand Kurdish people as barbaric and uneducated.

Thousands of Kurds lost their lives during the 80s and 90s fighting against their Turkish oppressions, and yet the situation barely improved.

Cue the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

When the US, UK and other Western countries invaded Iraq, Kurds fought alongside the allies, and against Saddam's army. They managed to create an autonomous region in Iraq because of it. When ISIS began grabbing mass amounts of land in Iraq, the Kurds fought back with allied assistance and stamped them out.

When ISIS started taking land and murdering thousands in Syria, the Syrian President Assad ordered his army to leave the region and he left millions of Kurds there to die. They would have done too if it weren't for the assistance of coalition air strikes and weapons that allowed them to push ISIS back and carve out another autonomous region in their homeland.

That region is Rojava. The people there live under a system called Democratic Confederalism which is based on workers' rights, equality, feminism, and ecology. In principal, this version of democracy is far more democratic than any system used in a Western country today.

The Kurds didn't want to team up with the US in Syria, they just didn't want to die, and they were left with no option after being abandoned by Assad.

Now the US has abandoned the Kurds and left them to die too. They're no longer "useful" and heaven forbid America is seen to be assisting a people who don't bow to the international banking cartel, and are determined to live in a real democracy.

The US said it wanted to bring "democracy" to the Middle East, but not THAT sort of democracy.

Assad and Russia refuse to back Kurds now because they worked with the US instead of being murdered. And Turkey (the biggest oppressor of the Kurdish people, and the country that literally funded ISIS) has invaded their land with one of the largest armies in NATO with the intention of ethnic cleansing, genocide and freeing ISIS prisoners.

The Kurdish people just can't win. Every major global power uses them when it suits their agenda, and then they feed them to the wolves.

The US won't stand up for the Kurds. The Syrian Government won't stand up for them, and neither will Iran or Russia. That is why every single person with a heart reading this must raise their voice now!

There's an old Kurdish saying that goes:

"NO FRIENDS BUT THE MOUNTAINS"

Do you sympathise with the PKK?
But they aren't active in Syria. However, they have protected the Kurds for decades.
It is false that the YPG is part of the PKK, that's a big lie.

Of course, they have the second most powerful armed forces of the terrorist NATO.
The NATO along with the criminal Turkish State and many other have created the dirty war in Syria.

I sympathise with all those being oppressed by fascists..

You just have to bear in mind, where Turkey is on the map, and soon you know why Turkey is so important to NATO and US.

you said about the invasion of Iraq, "Kurds fought alongside the allies"

what Kurds? The Kurds of the KDP?
The KDP was always an unconditional ally of the West and Britain. What's more,they have good relationships with Turkey (a PKK enemy).
The KDP was an ally of the Sadam's army against the Kurdish revolts and uprisings during the 90's. Many Kurds denounced the collaboration of the KDP leadership with Saddam.

But if you start to think about other KURDS, like the PKK guerrillas or the Iraqi Yazidis, they weren't allies of the UK or US. The PKK attempted to wage a war against the Americans during the Gulf War.

So, is the British Government fascist?

or the British companies which make great arms-deals with other fascists?

Yes the British Government are fascists.

What point are you trying to get across?