General election: Starmer and Sunak clash over Conservatives’ national service plan

Published

1 year ago

May 27, 2024

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Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer have come to blows over the Conservatives’ plan to introduce national service for teenagers.

Labour leader Sir Keir said the Conservatives’ first major policy announcement of the election campaign would amount to a “teenage Dad’s Army”, in reference to the popular 70s sitcom about a hapless group of men who were ineligible for military service.

But the prime minister defended his plan for 18-year-olds to serve in the military for a year or do mandatory volunteering, saying it is “absolutely the right policy at the right time”.

Sir Keir called the policy “desperate”.

“All this spinning round and round, it’s symbolic of the chaos and the instability,” the Labour leader added.

“You’ve seen that again over the past few days, the desperation of this national service policy, a sort of teenage Dad’s Army, paid for, I kid you not, by cancelling levelling up funding and money from tax avoidance that we would use to invest in our NHS.

“I think they are rummaging around in the toy box to try and find any plan that they can throw on the table. I don’t think it’ll work.”

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Mr Sunak insisted the plan would “give young people skills and opportunities for life”.

He added: “It’s going to foster a culture of service that will make our society more cohesive. And it’s going to strengthen our country’s resilience and security.

“So I think it’s absolutely the right policy at the right time.”

He dismissed suggestions mandatory national service was an un-conservative policy, and said: “I believe this is the right thing to do because this is how we’ll deliver a secure future for everyone and our country.”

Sir Keir, in his first major speech of the campaign, said the Conservatives were planning to take money from the levelling up fund to pay for the national service policy, which shows “they’ve completely abandoned the project they put before the electorate in 2019”.

He accused Mr Sunak of governing to appease sections of the Tory party, not for the whole country, and said the government’s Rwanda policy was evidence of that.

Placing security at the heart of his speech, Sir Keir said the scheme to send asylum seekers to Rwanda was part of Mr Sunak’s “gimmicks and gestures”.

“He never believed in it. He knew it wouldn’t work. He said that they tried to stop it when he was chancellor, but he was too weak to stand up to his party,” he said.

“He caved in, and now he’s gone through and it’s cost £600m. And now has called an election before it can be tested. Weakness upon weakness.”

The Labour leader admitted he was “not against third country processing” and it has been successful in places such as Afghanistan but said there was a difference in processing people in a different country and “simply deporting people to Rwanda”.

During his speech on Monday, Sir Keir went over the policies Labour is offering up to voters as he tried to persuade them he has turned the Labour Party around from its Jeremy Corbyn era.

Labour’s six ‘core tests’

Economic stability – keep inflation, taxes and mortages low
NHS – cut waiting times, 4,000 extra appointments a week, paid for by cracking down on tax avoidance and non-doms
Border security – new Border Security Command with more resources and new powers to stop criminal gangs bringing people over in small boats
Energy – new company called Great British Energy harnessing clean power and making the UK energy independent, paid for by a windfall tax on energy companies
Anti-social behaviour crackdown – 13,000 new police and community support officers paid for by
Education – 6,500 new teachers paid for by introducing VAT and business tax on private schools

But Mr Sunak accused the Labour leader of having “no plan, no ideas”.

“We’ve had another speech from Keir Starmer, another half hour speech. Not a single new idea. He’s taking the British public for granted,” he said.

“I’m the one that’s putting bold ideas on the table. I’m the one that’s got a plan, and that’s how we’re going to deliver a secure future for everyone.

“And as I said his approach is to take people for granted. He’s got nothing to say, no plan, no ideas.”

Politics

Thodex CEO found dead: How this $2B crypto scam changed Turkish law

Published

3 hours ago

November 8, 2025

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Thodex CEO found dead: How this B crypto scam changed Turkish law

Faruk Fatih Özer was found dead in his prison cell on Nov. 1. The former CEO of now-defunct crypto exchange Thodex was serving an 11,000-year sentence for running one of the largest crypto scams in history.

His death marks the latest turn in the Thodex saga, with ripple effects so significant they altered Turkish cryptocurrency laws.

The initial details of Özer’s death point to suicide, but the investigation is still ongoing. It has once more brought Thodex back into the spotlight.

Here’s a look back at Özer’s story, how the crypto exchange impacted Turkish law and how it may have contributed to the country’s increased crypto adoption.

$2-billion Thodex scam sees raids, arrest and CEO out on the lam

On April 21, 2021, Thodex cryptocurrency exchange suddenly shut down trading and withdrawals. The initial announcement read that this could continue for four to five days. As Cointelegraph Turkey reported at the time, the exchange claimed that this was to improve its operations with the help of “world-renowned banks and funding companies.”

But local media reported that Özer had fled to Thailand with over $2 billion in funds as part of an exit scam. There were also reports that police had raided the exchange’s offices in Istanbul.

Istanbul’s chief prosecutor’s office corroborated the reports the following day. It announced a probe into Thodex and said police had arrested 62 people allegedly involved in the scam. Özer denied the accusations, claiming his trip abroad was to meet foreign investors.

As of April 30, 2021, a Turkish court decided to jail six suspects, including family members of the missing CEO and senior company employees, pending trial. Interpol also issued a red notice for Özer.

“When he is caught with the red notice, we have extradition agreements with a large part of these countries. God willing he will be caught and he will be returned,” said Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu.

Özer managed to evade capture for over a year. Albanian authorities eventually detained him on Aug. 30, 2022. He attempted to appeal extradition in court, but the decision was upheld, and Özer was in Turkish custody by April 30, 2023, two years after the scandal began.

*Özer was detained by Turkish authorities after being extradited from Albania. Source:* AA

The case against Özer was swift. In July 2023, just three months after arriving in Turkey, he was sentenced to seven months and 15 days in prison for failing to submit certain documents requested by the Tax Inspection Board during the trial.

On Sept. 8, 2023, the Anatolian 9th High Criminal Court sentenced Özer, along with two of his siblings, to 11,196 years, 10 months and 15 days in prison, along with a $5-million fine.

In court, Özer claimed that he and his family were facing false accusations. He said, “I am smart enough to manage all institutions in the world. This is evident from the company I founded at the age of 22. If I were to establish a criminal organization, I would not act so amateurishly. … It is clear that the suspects in the file have been victims for more than 2 years.”

Özer was serving his sentence at the Tekirdağ No. 1 F-Type High Security Closed Penal Institution when he died. F-Type prisons are high-security institutions reserved for political prisoners, members of organized crime syndicates and other armed groups serving an aggravated life sentence.

Human rights advocates have repeatedly raised concerns about the conditions at F-Type prisons. In 2007, Amnesty International noted “harsh and arbitrary” disciplinary treatments, as well as isolation.

Turkey changes its laws to protect investors

The Thomex scandal and its ensuing fallout were so significant that they drove the Turkish government to change its policies toward cryptocurrencies.

Immediately following news of Özer fleeing the country, the Central Bank of the Republic of Turkey banned crypto payments and prohibited payment providers from offering fiat on-ramps for crypto exchanges. The official notice outlawed “any direct or indirect usage of crypto assets in payment services and electronic money issuance.” Notably, the ban excluded banks, meaning that users can still deposit lira onto crypto exchange accounts using bank transfers.

The ban aimed to ensure financial stability, while other agencies like the Capital Markets Board (CMB) and the Financial Crimes Investigation Board (MASAK) moved to legitimize trading activities. In May 2021, MASAK amended money laundering and terrorism financing laws to include provisions for cryptocurrency.

By 2024, the “Law on Amendments to the Capital Markets Law” came into effect. This built on the initial changes in 2021, which included extensive consumer protection measures in addition to provisions on licensing and reporting.

These new measures, which also aimed to move Turkey off the Financial Action Task Force’s “gray list” of countries with inadequate Anti-Money Laundering measures, have in turn helped spur the local crypto industry.

Chainalysis’ “2025 Geography of Crypto Report” found that Turkey led the Middle East and North Africa in value received in crypto. Trading activity also spiked last year.

In the long term, the Thodex scandal may have led to increased crypto adoption in the country, but only after it rocked the Turkish crypto industry and left many investors out to dry. It also resulted in the imprisonment and death of its orchestrator and CEO.

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