Turkey's president will introduce the country's new human rights action plan on Tuesday.

The plan is to be a main policy document for Turkey as the country prepares to mark its 100th anniversary. The document is expected to emphasize property rights, vested rights, individual criminal responsibility, and presumption of innocence, while also enhancing transparency, accountability, and judicial independence, and objectivity.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is expected to attend the event in capital Ankara, along with political party leaders, the country's parliament speaker, Cabinet ministers, ambassadors, and representatives of the UN, EU, European Council, and European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

Milestone

The plan's final goal is reportedly to facilitate drafting a new constitution for the country and is set to serve as a milestone for efforts being made for this purpose.

It aims to expand rights and freedoms, and introduce protections for individuals on property and contract rights.

Legal predictability and transparency, freedom of speech, organization, and religion also make up a significant part of the plan.

It involves important steps for the protection of vulnerable groups and strengthening social welfare.

The action plan consists of nine objectives and 11 basic principles aimed at raising human rights standards in Turkey.

The principles of the action plan emphasize the protection and development of inalienable rights and human dignity. Universal equality before the law, regardless of language, race, color, gender, political stance, philosophical belief, religion, or sect, as well as equal access to public services are also underlined in the plan.

It further aims to ensure easy access to effective legal remedies for those claiming that their rights were violated.

The plan's objectives mainly focus on human rights protection, judiciary independence and the right to a fair trial, legal predictability and transparency, freedom of expression, organization and religion, personal freedom and security, protection of individuals' material and moral integrity, and private life, protection of property rights, protection of vulnerable groups, social welfare and high-level administrative and social awareness on human rights.

Preparation

In its one-and-a-half years of preparation of the Human Rights Action Plan, the Justice Ministry included all segments of society in its efforts.

A total of five workshops and 53 meetings were held with 1,571 participants, including domestic and international non-governmental organizations, labor unions, bar associations, law faculty deans, judges, prosecutors, lawyers, academics, and representatives of non-Muslim communities.

The lawyers, academics, and bureaucrats who took part in the action plan's preparation worked for approximately 2,380 hours.

During this process, the findings from the previous 2014-2019 Action Plan were analyzed, along with verdicts of the European Court of Human Rights, Turkey's Constitutional Court and other high courts, the reports and recommendations of relevant committees of the Council of Europe and UN, country reports of the EU, OSCE documents and Human Rights Action Plans that other countries have submitted to the UN./aa

Zimbabwe’s Vice President Kembo Mohadi on Monday stepped down, battered by reports of a scandal involving illicit sexual relations.

His statement of resignation took effect immediately, but Mohadi maintained his innocence, blaming disinformation for his stepping down.

He said he decided to resign "not as a matter of cowardice but as a sign of demonstrating great respect to the office of the President."

In the letter, released to the media by the president's office, Mohadi said he was the victim of voice forgery.

Claims made via social media contained alleged recordings of his telephone calls with married women.

The resignation made Mohadi the first vice president of Zimbabwe, a landlocked country in Southern Africa, to resign from office since independence./aa

Turkey posted a 12.7% year-on-year rise in crude steel production this January, according to trade group data released Monday.

Turkish crude steel production reached 3.4 million tons last January, the Turkish Steel Producers' Association (TCUD) said in a statement.

The volume of steel product exports fell 15.5% on an annual basis to 1.3 million tons in January, also marking a 1% drop in value to $749 million.

Steel imports reached 1.2 million tons, falling 14.3%, while in terms of value, they rose 12.2% to $872 million.

The ratio of exports to imports, which was 97.3% in January last year, declined to 85.9% the same month this year.

Turkey ranked first in Europe and seventh in the world with 35.8 million tons of crude steel production.

The country posted a 6% rise year-on-year to 35.8 million tons in crude steel production in 2020, according to the TCUD./aa

Turkey will reduce its import bill by $50 billion with an initiative supporting domestic output of hi-tech products, a senior official has announced.

"Under the Technology-Oriented Industry Move, we support investments to produce, with local means and capabilities, 919 products that are hi-tech or for which we incur a heavy foreign trade deficit," Industry and Technology Minister Mustafa Varank said Saturday on Twitter.

The ministry identified several areas and products that it said were of critical importance for the development of sectors such as chemicals, computer-electronic optics, machinery, pharmaceuticals, electrical equipment, transportation vehicles, and medical devices./aa

Turkey on Sunday condemned the Myanmar military junta's disproportionate use of force on peaceful protesters causing the loss of many civilian lives. 

“We observe with deep concern that the stability in Myanmar is deteriorating after the coup d'etat on 1 February 2021,” the Foreign Ministry said in a press release.

“We call for the necessary steps to be taken for the restoration of democracy without delay for the maintenance of peace and stability in the country and the immediate cessation of violence against the peaceful protesters,” the ministry added.

Earlier, The UN Human Rights Office also condemned the escalation of violence against anti-coup protesters in Myanmar, and said it has credible information that the use of force in the country left at least 18 people dead and more than 30 others wounded.

According to witnesses and local media, anti-coup demonstrators were met with tear gas, rubber bullets, and stun grenades as police and soldiers intensified a crackdown on a campaign against the recent military coup in the Southeast Asian country.

Myanmar has seen large protests since the military declared a state of emergency on Feb. 1 after detaining Aung San Suu Kyi and senior members of the then-ruling National League for Democracy (NLD)./aa

An Egyptian journalist, known for his criticism of the country's government, went missing upon his return to the country, his son said on Sunday.

Jamal Al-Jaml had arrived at Egypt's Cairo International Airport from Turkey's Istanbul Airport on Feb. 22 and his whereabouts remained unknown since then.

"My father was tired and wanted to come back to Egypt. The moment he reached the Cairo International Airport, he disappeared mysteriously and we could not reach him," Jamal's son Baha Al-Jaml said on Facebook.

According to media reports, Al-Jaml was sentenced to two years in jail for "insulting the judiciary" and expected to be transferred to Tora prison after interrogation.

In 2014, Al-Jaml wrote an article for the Egyptian-based Al-Masry Al-Youm daily in which he criticized the way of governance in the country and later Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi allegedly called to warn “him”.

The journalist left the country on a voluntary exile following the phone call from the Egyptian president.

Meanwhile, various Egyptian media outlets and opposition figures criticized the country's authority over Al-Jaml's disappearance./aa

The EU foreign policy chief on Saturday called on Myanmar’s military junta to end violence against civilians.

“The military authorities must immediately stop the use of force against civilians and allow the population to express their right to freedom of expression and assembly,” Josep Borrell said in a statement.

Earlier, the UN Human Rights Office condemned the escalation of violence against anti-coup protesters in Myanmar, and said it has credible information that the use of force in the country left at least 18 people dead and more than 30 others wounded.

Borrell called the latest developments a “brutal repression of peaceful protests.”

The EU foreign policy chief said that security forces should be held accountable for “shooting unarmed citizens” which is a “blatant disregard for international law”.

“Violence will not give legitimacy to the illegal over-throwing of the democratically-elected Government”, he added.

“The European Union will take measures in response to these developments shortly,” Borrell said.

EU foreign ministers did not impose restrictive measures on Myanmar during their meeting on Monday, but said the bloc was ready to order asset freeze and travel ban on those directly responsible for the military coup.

Myanmar has seen large protests since the military declared a state of emergency on Feb. 1 after detaining Suu Kyi and senior members of the then-ruling National League for Democracy (NLD)./aa

Turkish security forces on Sunday arrested a PKK/KCK terror suspect in southeastern Turkey, a security source said.

The suspect was caught when local gendarmerie teams stopped a suspicious vehicle in Gaziantep province as part of routine checks, said the source on condition of anonymity due to restrictions on speaking to the media.

Identified only by the initials M.K., the PKK/KCK terror suspect, is sought by the Istanbul High Criminal Court on charges of "being a member of an armed terrorist organization."

In its more than 35-year terror campaign against Turkey, the PKK -- listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the US, and EU -- has been responsible for the deaths of 40,000 people including women, children, and infants. YPG is its Syrian branch./aa