Saturday 28 December 2013

Turkish PM reshuffles cabinet amid scandal

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has replaced nearly half his cabinet in a reshuffle prompted by a spiralling corruption scandal.

Erdogan announced on television late on Wednesday that he had replaced three resigning ministers and his EU affairs minister, while reshuffling the justice, transport, family, sports and industry portfolios, and one of his four deputy prime ministers’ posts.

The reshuffle was decided in a closed-door meeting with President Abdullah Gul, who had said since Tuesday that it was imminent.

Erdogan removed Egemen Bagis, the EU affairs minister, from his post, while outgoing minister Egemen Bagis, was excluded from the new line-up, replaced by politician, Mevlut Cavusoglu. Bagis was accused of being involved in the corruption scandal but has never been detained or formally charged.

Economy minister Zafer Caglayan, interior minister Muammer Guler and environment minister Erdogan Bayraktar resigned earlier on Wednesday over a high-level corruption crackdown in which sons of the ministers and renowned businessmen were arrested.

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