Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has continued his salvoes against a number of minorities, including Armenians and members of the LGBT community ahead of the June 7 general elections, accusing them of supporting the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), the Hurriyet Daily News reports.
“Their biggest ally is Dogan Media. The Armenian lobby, homosexuals and those who believe in ‘Alevism without Ali’ – all these representatives of sedition are [the HDP’s] benefactors,” Erdogan said during an address to citizens in the eastern province of Bingöl on June 3.
Speculation over whether the HDP, which focuses on the Kurdish issue, will be able to pass the 10 percent national election threshold is the key question that will determine how many seats the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) wins in parliament.
On June 3, the Turkish president also repeated his ever-toughening rhetoric against international media. “They also received the support of some foreign media outlets, which see Turkey as their colony,” he said.
Without mentioning the name of the AKP, which he co-founded, Erdogan said that “everyone should go and vote for the party he or she likes.”
In recent days for different reasons, Erdogan has slammed several media institutions including the daily Hurriyet, which is owned by the Dogan Media Group, daily Cumhuriyet, the New York Times, CNN International and the BBC.
Erdogan has made slights against Armenians on several occasions in the past, including last year, when he raged against opposition politicians for calling him an Armenian. “They called me a Georgian. Pardon me for saying this, but they said even uglier things: They called me an Armenian!” Erdogan said in an interview on national TV in August 2014.
