The Turkish Telecommunications Authority (BTK) on Wednesday imposed an access ban on the critical news website ahvalnews.com as the Turkish government’s crackdown on the press organizations continues at full speed.
Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdağ has denied rumors the government would call a snap election, saying that the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) always favors polls to take place on their planned dates.
“Elections in Turkey will be held on time. There will be no snap elections; there will be elections held on time,” Bozdağ told reporters after a meeting in Ankara on March 1.
Turkey is scheduled to hold local eletions in March 2019 and parliamentary and presidential elections in November 2019.
Une adresse à l’opposition algérienne au moment où le pays “s’abîme” non plus seulement dans une crise politique mais “dans une impasse historique”, c’est ce qu’a fait Said Sadi en publiant cette semaine un texte intitulé “Oppositions algériennes : au-delà du pouvoir” sur le site électronique Middle East Eye.
The opposition Kataeb Party has decided not to ally with the Lebanese Forces in the upcoming parliamentary elections seeing as the LF is part of the ruling coalition, a media report said.
"Kataeb has informed all parties concerned, topped by the LF, that its alliances will be political and based on clear stances against the policies and parties of the ruling class," a source informed on contacts between Christian parties told al-Joumhouria daily in remarks published Thursday.
The Free Patriotic Movement and the al-Mustaqbal Movement will be on the same electoral list in the Bsharri-Zgharta-Koura-Batroun electoral district, FPM sources have said.
“It is not possible for us to ally with al-Marada Movement if it will back Najib Miqati in Akkar or Tripoli and the Lebanese Forces will not get our votes if it will back Ashraf Rifi,” the sources told the Kuwaiti al-Anbaa newspaper in remarks published Thursday.
“There are standards that do not allow us to deal with each district separately,” the sources added.
Naharnet Newsdesk
The Assistant of the President of the Republic, and the Vice president of the National congress for party affairs, Dr Faisal Hassan Ibrahim, on Thursday underlined the coming period requires huge efforts in the political life of the country.
Dr Faisal pointed out that this means doubling efforts for completing drafting of the Sudan permanent constitution, naming the various commissions as agreed upon in the document of the National accord, as well as preparing a conducive political climate that would bring closer all and do away with exclusionist rhetorics.
Sudan’s National Umma Party said on Wednesday that its leader Sadiq al-Mahdi has delayed to a later date his return to the country upon the recommendation of the party.
On the first of February, al-Mahdi travelled to Addis Ababa for a consultations meeting with the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel on the Roadmap agreement on the political process with the government.
The opposition Sudanese Congress Party (SCoP) has called to release its leader Omer al-Digair who is detained since about two months ago, pointing he has been facing a critical health situation.
Al-Digair was arrested while he was in El-Obeid the capital of North Kordofan last January, after calls by his party to protest the increase of bred price within a series of drastic austerity measures included in the budget of 2018.
In total 57,020 candidates are running in local elections in 350 municipalities in Tunisia on May 6, the Independent High Authority for Elections (ISIE) said on Tuesday.
It seems obvious that Libya is not in a fit state to hold an election, but the international community seems determined to organise one anyway, writes the BBC North Africa C
Egypt’s National Election Authority (NEA)
The Iraqi Council of Ministers has reportedly set the 22nd December 2018 as the date for the provincial elections to be held in Iraq.
Previously, the provincial elections were scheduled for before the national elections; however, the fight against the IS as well as the ongoing displacement crisis prevented these from being held earlier.
The vote was originally scheduled to be held on the 16th September 2017, but was later postponed with reports suggesting that they would be held in conjunction with the national elections set for May of this year.
The High National Election Commission (HNEC) has extended the period for overseas voter registration until Monday 12 March. Overseas voter registration was due to end tomorrow.
HNEC said that in view of the moderate rate of overseas voter registration and due to requests by the Libyan diaspora for HNEC to extend the registration period as a result of their inability to register in time, it has pushed back the deadline to 12 March.
Pakistan’s ruling party on Tuesday chose Shahbaz Sharif as its president, officials said, replacing his brother and veteran leader Nawaz Sharif following his latest disqualification by the Supreme Court. The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party also elected Nawaz as “leader for life”, in what will be seen as a provocative move and could anger the judiciary after last week’s Supreme Court verdict that removed Sharif as party leader.
Egypt’s Supreme State Security Prosecution on Tuesday ordered Egyptian former-presidential candidate and head of the Strong Egypt Party Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh be detained for a further 15 days on charges of “leading a terrorist group.”
Egyptian security forces arrested Fotouh on Wednesday February 14 for alleged ties with Egypt’s outlawed Muslim Brotherhood (MB). He was taken away upon his return home from London, where he reportedly gave an interview to Qatari owned Al-Jazeera and criticized state policies and President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi.
Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri has accepted an invitation to visit Saudi Arabia, his office said, in what would be his first trip to the kingdom after he resigned under mysterious circumstances from the Saudi capital last year.
The announcement came at the end of a meeting Monday in Beirut that Hariri held with Saudi envoy Nizar al-Aloula and advisers to the Saudi royal court.
Hariri said he would visit Saudi Arabia "as soon as possible" and that the talks had been "excellent," according to the statement.
L’arrivée du président providentiel Aziz Akhannouch, au lendemain des législatives de 2016, a permis au Rassemblement national des indépendants (RNI) de se métamorphoser. En 14 mois, ce dernier s’est doté de nouvelles structures, a cerné son positionnement politique et présente même une ébauche d’offre politique. Détails.
Two more Kurdish issue-focused Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) deputies have been stripped of their parliamentary status following criminal verdicts against them were read out at a parliamentary session.
The summaries of proceedings against MPs Ahmet Yıldırım and İbrahim Ayhan included the final verdict of separate legal cases against them and was read aloud at parliament’s General Assembly on Feb. 27.
