UPDATE - Turkey files investigation into Dutch lawmaker

ADDS BACKGROUND ON WILDERS' POST; UPDATES WITH COMMUNICATION DIRECTOR ALTUN'S STATEMENT

By Cemil Murat Budak

ANKARA (AA) - Turkish prosecutors filed an investigation Tuesday into far-right Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders over a social media post seeking to vilify Turkey's president.

The chief public prosecutor's office in the capital Ankara said in a statement that the probe involving Wilders, who heads the Party for Freedom, was opened due to a Twitter post "including a photograph and written insult about President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Feb. 15."

On Feb. 15, Wilders had shared a post on Twitter insulting Erdogan and calling NATO to expel Turkey.

Dismissing remarks by Wilders and his "merry band of neo-Nazis" as having never "amounted to anything," Turkey's Communications Director Fahrettin Altun voiced concern that Europe's "seemingly moderate governments and ostensibly responsible policymakers" appeared to share the far-right politician's views.

Referring to a leaked report by the Dutch National Coordinator for Counterterrorism and Security (NCTV) containing various claims against the Turkish community in the Netherlands, Altun said the "groundless, biased and ignorant" document should be taken as a greater concern than Wilders.

"Turkey and the Turkish community in Europe have always been a bulwark against terrorism and extremism. To say otherwise is to serve racism and Islamophobia," said the official.

* Contributions and writing by Dilan Pamuk in Ankara