Ramadan

The Islamic holy month of Ramadan begins on June 6 with Muslims in Turkey set to practice fasting, one of the Five Pillars of Islam, until July 4. 

During every Ramadan, news erupts in the Turkish press claiming China is oppressing Uighur Turks in the country and banning their practice of Islam. As usual, this was again the case last month. Similar news was broadly covered in the media upon which anti-China demonstrations and attacks took place throughout Turkey. 

Yet are these claims valid? Are Uighurs tyrannized in China? 

Turkey has seen the steepest decrease in hotel occupancy rates in Europe, excluding Russia, according to STR Global's June figures. 

The hotel occupancy rates were announced as 68.6 percent in June, a 7.6 percent decrease from the same month of 2014.  

More than 40 people drowned across Turkey in the week including the four-day Eid al-Fitr holiday, police said July 21.

According to figures compiled from police reports since July 14, at least 44 people drowned throughout the country, while three others remain missing.

Its one-and-a-half months since the general election, in which the conservative Justice and Development Party (AK Parti) lost its power in parliament to establish a government of its own. But Turkey still doesn?t yet have a new government.

Pakistan has accused India of another breach of their ceasefire in the disputed Kashmir region, after reporting the death of four civilians in earlier cross-border shelling.
 

Rescuers in the Iraqi town of Khan Bani Saad search collapsed buildings for bodies after a huge car bomb ripped through a busy market, killing at least 90 people Rescuers in the Iraqi town of Khan Bani Saad were searching collapsed buildings for bodies July 18 after a huge car bomb ripped through a busy market, killing at least 90 people.

The northern Turkish town of Safranbolu, which is on the UNESCO World Heritage list and one of the 20 best-preserved historic sites around the world, is seeing full occupancy in its hotels for the Eid Ramadan holiday, the city's mayor has said. 

At least 13 people were killed July 17 in triple blasts in the northeastern Nigerian city of Damaturu as residents prepared to celebrate the Eid festival marking the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

The attacks, in an area hard hit by the Boko Haram insurgency, came just days before Nigeria's new President Muhammadu Buhari is to meet his U.S. counterpart Barack Obama.

President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an has toughened his position against the People?s Democratic Party (HDP) by implying that it has ties with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers? Party (PKK) and acts as a parliamentary extension of the PKK. Erdo?an?s statement came only two days after HDP officials called the PKK to disarm and cease armed conflict against Turkey.