Hedo Turkoglu Rips Enes Kanter for 'Irrational' Assassination Fears
New York Knicks big man Enes Kanter turned heads when he said he wouldn't travel to London for his team's Jan. 17 game against the Washington Wizards due to tension with Turkey President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and fears he would be assassinated.
Former NBA player Hedo Turkoglu, who is also from Turkey and serves as the president of the Turkish Basketball Federation, called Kanter's comments "irrational" and criticized the Knicks playmaker in a lengthy statement provided by TMZ Sports:
"I received with concern the news about the delusions targeting the Republic of Turkey of Enes Kanter, who pledged his loyalty to the ringleader of Fetullashist Terrorist Organization (FETO), and his statement that he would miss the game in London due to fears of being assassinated by Turkey.
"We know that he has not been able to travel to many countries due to visa issues since 2017. In other words, Kanter cannot enter the U.K. not because of fears for life as he claims but due to passport and visa issues. This being the long known truth, he is trying to get the limelight with irrational justifications and political remarks.
"Such remarks constitute another example of the political smear campaign Kanter has been conducting against Turkey as well as his efforts to attribute importance to himself by covering up the contradictions in his sports career.
"Kanter not only targeted the Republic of Turkey, governed by the rule of law, with unjust accusations but he also regarded the British security forces as weak and attempted to harm Turkish-British relations.
"It is obvious that this person's remarks are irrational and distort the truth."
Later Monday, Kanter spoke to reporters, referring to Turkoglu as Erdogan's "lapdog."
Kanter has long been an outspoken critic of Erdogan, who he called the "Hitler of our century" in a May 2017 Twitter post when he was detained while traveling through a Romanian airport:
In December 2017, Mike Vorkunov of the New York Times noted Turkey's state-run news agency reported prosecutors wanted Kanter to be jailed for four or more years after he insulted Erdogan.
Vorkunov explained the Knicks big man is a supporter of Fethullah Gulen, who lives in the United States and faced accusations from Turkey that he attempted a 2016 coup against Erdogan.
“Four years? That's it?” Kanter said at the time. “For all of the trash I've been talking?”
The Turkish government sentenced Kanter's father, Mehmet, to prison for 15 years in June, and Kanter provided a statement to Bleacher Report's Yaron Weitzman in which he said he will continue “fighting for human rights and freedom of speech."
As for the game against the Wizards in London, a team official said Kanter would not be attending because of an issue with his visa, per Vorkunov (now of The Athletic).
