Turkey intends to reconsider its decision to abolish the death penalty, made almost two decades ago. The fire in the country’s resorts at the beginning of last week was the reason for the violent reaction in response. This was stated by Justice Minister Saeed Bekir Bozdag, citing President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who intends to act decisively on the piles of resort towns, Turkish media reported.
Erdogan said last Friday that the circumstances were pushing the authorities to toughen radical methods of punishment against the Palais after the alleged deliberate fire. According to officials, since the fire was contained, it has destroyed about 4,500 hectares of coastal forests in the western Aegean region of the country.
In this regard, the measures should be “terrible” up to death sentences, said the head of state. It will be recalled that Turkey abolished the death penalty in 2004 as part of negotiations on accession to the European Union.
Turkish police arrested one person on Friday over forest fires. Local media then reported that the suspects admitted that they were the cause of the fire. The reason is an attack of rage due to a family dispute.
This week’s fires evoked memories of last year’s fires, the worst in the country’s history. Last year, there were 2,105 forest outbreaks in Turkey. Then the resorts were on fire, and tourists were evacuated en masse by water and land. 140,000 hectares of rural areas across Turkey were burned to ashes. Weekly fires in the popular coastal provinces of the Aegean and Mediterranean, which began in July 2021, killed eight people.
Earlier, the DIP wrote that “Turkish Antalya was covered by hellish heat and high humidity: because of which tourists spend the night on the beaches.”