Tag: Latakia

  • Tourism: Turkish hotelier to take legal action against Syria

    Tourism: Turkish hotelier to take legal action against Syria

    dedeman latakia

    (ANSAmed) – ISTANBUL, JANUARY 19 – Syria has “a malignant attitude” toward the Dedeman Hotels International, as well as other Turkish and foreign businesses active in the country, according to a press release yesterday by the company, a Turkish hotelier, whose hotel operating contracts were canceled by the Syrian government, as daily Hurriyet reports today. Contracts that granted the Istanbul-based Dedeman the right to operate hotels in three Syrian cities were canceled by the Syrian government in the last four weeks. The first contract regarding Dedeman Hotel Aleppo was canceled December 29, 2011, and contracts regarding Dedeman’s Damascus and Tadmur hotels were canceled Januariy 17, according to Sana, Syria’s official news agency. Dedeman has not yet received any official notice from Syria about the cancellations, the company said. “It is saddening to reflect its domestic political developments in business life this way. We will take every step to protect our legal rights,” said Tamer Yorukoglu, Dedeman Hotels & Resorts International CEO. Dedeman could not meet forecasts envisaged in the auction process due to an economic crisis that started in 2009 and the instability caused by the political developments which came about from the beginning of last year, Dedeman said.

    The renovation of three hotels had be assumed by the Syrian Ministry of Tourism according to the contracts, but the obligation was fulfilled by the ministry, said the company, adding that renovation project for those three hotels was submitted to the tourism ministry, but no positive move was made. (ANSAmed).

  • Top Russian spy’s body washes up ‘after swimming accident’

    Top Russian spy’s body washes up ‘after swimming accident’

    The body of one of Russia’s top spies has washed up on the Turkish coast after he disappeared close to a sensitive Russian naval facility in neighbouring Syria.

    By Andrew Osborn, Moscow

    ivanov
    Gen. Yuri Ivanov, 52, deputy head of GRU, the Russian military's overseas intelligence arm of Russian military, was found dead in mysterious circumstances

    Major-General Yuri Ivanov, 52, was the deputy head of Russia’s foreign military intelligence arm known as GRU which is thought to operate the biggest network of foreign spies out of all of Russia’s clandestine intelligence services.

    His badly decomposed body was found washed up on the Turkish coast by local fishermen earlier this month after he disappeared in the Syrian coastal resort of Latakia further south. The Russian army’s in-house newspaper, Red Star, did not report his death until last Saturday when he was quietly buried in Moscow.

    The circumstances of his death are reminiscent of a John Le Carre novel and have therefore fuelled theories that he may have been murdered in Syria and his body then thrown into the Mediterranean where it drifted for days.

    According to the Kremlin, he was on holiday in Syria and died in a tragic swimming accident. However, other reports have suggested he was on official business and the location where he is reported to have disappeared was only about fifty miles from a strategically vital Russian naval facility in the Syrian port of Tartus which is being expanded and upgraded to service and refuel ships from Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

    The facility is Russia’s only foothold in the Mediterranean Sea, and Mossad, Israel’s national intelligence agency, is known to be concerned that Moscow will use the upgraded facility as a base for spy ships and electronic espionage directed at the Middle East. The port is also close to the Turkish port of Ceyhan, a terminal for the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline which is seen as a lifeline for Georgia, against whom Russia fought a short war in 2008.

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/7973346/Top-Russian-spys-body-washes-up-after-swimming-accident.html, 31 Aug 2010