{"id":389766,"date":"2018-01-08T15:22:06","date_gmt":"2018-01-08T15:22:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=389766"},"modified":"2018-01-08T15:23:33","modified_gmt":"2018-01-08T15:23:33","slug":"shots-fired-footballer-germany","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=389766","title":{"rendered":"Shots fired at footballer in Germany"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"story-body__introduction\">A German-Kurdish footballer and well-known critic of the Turkish government has survived a suspected murder attempt while driving in western Germany.<\/p>\n<p>At least two bullets fired from a passing car hit Deniz Naki&#8217;s car on a motorway near D\u00fcren on Sunday night, German media say. He was not injured.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I immediately ducked and then rolled right to the hard shoulder,&#8221; he told Die Welt newspaper.<\/p>\n<p>Naki plays for Amed SK in Turkey and previously played for German clubs.<\/p>\n<p>Last April a Turkish judge gave Naki a suspended jail sentence of 18 months for &#8220;spreading terrorist propaganda for the PKK&#8221;, the separatist Kurdistan Workers&#8217; Party.<\/p>\n<p>In 2016 the Turkish Football Federation gave him a 12-match ban for &#8220;ideological propaganda&#8221; linked to the Kurdish conflict.<\/p>\n<p>But there is no evidence that the shooting was directly linked to the Turkish state, and Turkey has not commented on it.<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with Die Welt, Naki said two shots had been fired from a large black car.\u00a0&#8220;One bullet struck a window, in the middle of my car, the other one hit near a tyre.&#8221; Die Welt shows photos of the two bullet holes.<\/p>\n<p>Police are investigating and treating the case as a murder attempt.<\/p>\n<p>Naki grew up in D\u00fcren and played for the German clubs FC St. Pauli and SC Paderborn.<\/p>\n<p>He said he believed it to be a politically motivated attack, possibly by the Turkish MIT secret service.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I assume it was a MIT agent or somebody else who doesn&#8217;t like my politics,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p>He had not received specific threats recently, he said, &#8220;but I&#8217;m attacked on social media constantly&#8221;.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"media-landscape has-caption full-width\"><span class=\"image-and-copyright-container\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"responsive-image__img js-image-replace\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef-1.bbci.co.uk\/news\/624\/media\/images\/92321000\/jpg\/_92321147_fbefcc04-7992-4f16-9caa-261a887d73ff.jpg\" alt=\"Deniz Naki's right arm with a tattoo\" width=\"624\" height=\"351\" data-highest-encountered-width=\"624\" \/><\/span><\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Turkish forces have been battling the PKK in eastern Turkey since a ceasefire collapsed in July 2015. Turkey, the EU and US treat the PKK as a terrorist organisation.<\/p>\n<p>Ethnic Turkish and Kurdish critics of the Turkish government living in Germany accuse Ankara of intimidating opponents at home and abroad. Germany has Europe&#8217;s largest Turkish diaspora &#8211; an estimated three million.<\/p>\n<p>Cansu \u00d6zdemir, a left-wing, ethnic Turkish politician in Hamburg, tweeted that the attack signalled a threat to opponents of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Germany.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I fear Erdogan&#8217;s hit squads will carry on until every intimidated person shuts up,&#8221; she said. &#8220;This seriously menacing situation must not be played down any longer.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>Source: BBC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A German-Kurdish footballer and well-known critic of the Turkish government has survived a suspected murder attempt while driving in western Germany. At least two bullets fired from a passing car hit Deniz Naki&#8217;s car on a motorway near D\u00fcren on Sunday night, German media say. He was not injured. &#8220;I immediately ducked and then rolled [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":389774,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[142],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-389766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389766","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=389766"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389766\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/389774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=389766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=389766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=389766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}