Turkey Continues Its Witch Hunt Against Gülen Followers
Photos of the individuals arrested and detained. Source: Turkish Minute.
Date posted: September 3, 2016
MICHAEL VAN DER GALIEN
The purges continue unabated in Turkey. On Friday, 218 individuals were arrested on charges of being members of a terrorist organization. Another 421 were detained.
These arrests and detentions took place more than 6 weeks after the Turkish military staged a failed coup. In the meantime, not only the military officers responsible for the coup have been arrested, but the same goes for many others: people who had absolutely nothing to do with the coup, but who are simply accused of sympathizing with Fethullah Gülen, the Islamic scholar Turkey says masterminded the coup.
In what’s becoming a repetitive story, a host of journalists, lawyers, teachers and civil servants were among those arrested by the authorities.
All in all, more than 41,000 people have been detained in recent weeks, and more than 22,000 individuals were arrested. According to the latest reports, a sum total of 130,000 people have lost their jobs.
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At public rallies, Erdoğan has been floating a claim that a gang within the state is attacking his government in the name of corruption. He claimed he has evidence with regard to this group and wanted to expose this evidence soon.
Erdoğan has not offered any evidence so far indicating that such a group acting in violation of the law operates within the judiciary or police force.
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Hizmet movement has no political ambitions
The Journalists and Writers Foundation (GYV), whose honorary chairman is well-respected Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, released a statement on its website on Thursday explaining the stance of the Hizmet [service] movement (also know as Gulen movement) inspired by Gülen as a civilian one with no political ambitions. The association’s statement comes in response to […]
Failed 2016 coup was gov’t plot to purge Gülenists from state bodies, journalist claims
“July 15 was a terrifying incident. We still haven’t solved the mystery behind it. However, I can easily say it wasn’t a coup. … We must examine the results of such occurrences. Who benefited from it? They played [with us] under the pretext of a [fake] coup, and the government, one person [Erdoğan] profited handsomely from this, taking over the whole country,” Ataklı said.
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