PASTOR BRUNSON'S PARITY

ISTANBUL : PASTOR BRUNSON at centre of Turkey-US row and market turmoil.

Only week ago it would have seemed fanciful to draw a link between the fate of an American pastor in Turkey, a crises between two Nato allies and turmoil on global financial markets.

But Andrew Brunson, a Protestant clergyman who had lived in Turkey for a quarter of a century without disturbance, is now at the center of a bitter row pitting Washington against Ankara that caused the Lira to crash and the economic jitters to spread globally.

Bruson's world were turned upside down on Oct 7, 2016 when he and his wife Norine were arrested in a government crackdown following a failed coup bid in July that year aimed at toppling President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Norine was released two weeks later but Brunson was kept in jail and then charged with assisting two organisations regarded by Turkey as terror groups : the group of Fethullah Gulen blamed for the putsch and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party. [PKK].

Brunson, who marked his 50 birthday behind bars on June 3, faces 35 years in jail if convicted.

His arrest received relatively little media coverage at the time and efforts by US officials to release him were given initially only a very low profile in public.

But his continued detention for almost two years - without being convicted - has turned into one of the biggest bones of contention in the increasingly troubled relationship between Turkey and the  United States.

The tensions reached a new peak last week when President Donald Trump announced sanctions against Ankara, sending the Lira into a tailspin and raising fears of a full-blown economic crisis. [AFP]

The honor and serving of the world in *financial  crisis*, of this publishing continues.