Turkey’s ‘Nazi-style’ purge of academia condemned


Date posted: November 9, 2016

Jack Grove

The mass sacking of more than 1,200 academics in Turkey has been compared to tactics used in Nazi Germany.

Jean Asselborn, Luxembourg’s foreign minister, made his comments shortly after Turkish authorities released a list of 1,273 academics fired from public universities on 29 October.

It means more than 110,000 civil servants, academics and journalists have now been sacked or suspended since a plot to oust president Recep Tayyip Erdogan failed in July.

Those dismissed have been placed on an official blacklist, which makes it almost impossible for them to gain future employment, while some have had their passports revoked.

Mr Asselborn also accused Turkey of revoking some people’s degrees, the German newspaper Deutsche Welle reported.

“To put it bluntly, these are methods that were used during the Nazi era and that’s a really, really bad development…that the European Union simply cannot accept,” Mr Asselborn said.

The EU may be forced to impose economic sanctions if the crackdown continued, he said.

“At a certain point in time, we won’t have any choice but to apply [sanctions] to counteract the unbearable human rights situation,” he said.

His comments follow a protest by hundreds of academics, students and trade union members in Istanbul on 4 November over the government’s efforts to root out supposed support for the exiled Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen from its civil service.

More than 50,000 of those suspended, sacked or jailed are educational staff, while 37,000 have been jailed pending trial.

Turkey’s president also claimed greater powers over appointing university heads last month in a move that in effect “eradicates university autonomy”, critics said.

Source: Times Higher Education , November 7, 2016

Tags: | | | | |


Related News

First Lego League qualifier at Brooklyn Amity School

Brooklyn Amity School became a site where students dealt with all kinds of animals, including alligators, frogs, reindeer, sharks, cows, pandas, bees, and seals. As a host of the First Lego League qualifier competition, 11 different schools came to Amity School. This year, the FLL’s concept was “Animal Allies,” which allowed students to think and act like scientists and engineers.

Avni: New plot under way to blame Gülen movement for PKK attacks

A whistleblower who tweets under the pseudonym Fuat Avni has claimed that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his accomplices have devised a new plot against the faith-based Gülen movement, also known as the Hizmet movement, in which they will place blame for the recent increasing violence across Turkey on the movement.

International photography contest “Peace at the Frame”

The Journalist and Writers Foundation’s (GYV) Intercultural Dialogue Platform announces its first, annual photography contest. GYV likes to draw attention one more time to the peace, which is need more than ever these days through art of photography .GYV intends to unite everybody who can put the peace at his/her frame with the expertise of the art of photography.

Gülen urges Turkey to preserve, advance achievements in democratization

Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen has called for the preservation and advancement of the country’s achievements in democratization, describing this as “crucial.” In an interview with The Atlantic magazine, Gülen said Turkey’s ongoing relationship with the European Union is partly to be commended for the level of democratization Turkey has achieved so far.

Turkey’s New Maps Are Reclaiming the Ottoman Empire

Erdogan, by contrast, has given voice to an alternative narrative in which Ataturk’s willingness in the Treaty of Lausanne to abandon territories such as Mosul and the now-Greek islands in the Aegean was not an act of eminent pragmatism but rather a betrayal. The suggestion, against all evidence, is that better statesmen, or perhaps a more patriotic one, could have gotten more.

Terrorist organization, you say

He is 73 years old and is known as a respected scholar who has been studying Islamic exegesis. He is well-known in academia. He was promoted to associate professor in the field of Islamic exegesis back in 1977. He served as head of the exegesis department at the faculty of theology at Erzurum’s Atatürk University, conducted research in Paris Sorbonne, taught at the faculty of Islamic studies at the Islamic University of Madinah, was the chair of exegesis studies at Marmara University and conducted academic studies at International Islamic University of Malaysia. He is the author of 13 books and hundreds of articles.

Latest News

Turkish inmate jailed over alleged Gülen links dies of heart attack in prison

Message of Condemnation and Condolences for Mass Shooting at Bondi Beach, Sydney

Media executive Hidayet Karaca marks 11th year in prison over alleged links to Gülen movement

ECtHR faults Turkey for convictions of 2,420 applicants over Gülen links in follow-up to 2023 judgment

New Book Exposes Erdoğan’s “Civil Death Project” Targeting the Hizmet Movement

European Human Rights Treaty Faces Legal And Political Tests

ECtHR rejects Turkey’s appeal, clearing path for retrials in Gülen-linked cases

Erdoğan’s Civil Death Project’ : The ‘politicide’ spanning more than a decade

Fethullah Gülen’s Vision and the Purpose of Hizmet

In Case You Missed It

Media freedom in Turkey takes another blow

The message at the dialogue dinner: There’s no alternative to one Nigeria

‘Islam and I’

Is there anybody there for Kimse Yok Mu?

AFSV Statement on Temporary US Travel and Immigration Ban

Does the Gülen movement securitize the Kurdish question?

Inside the rural Pa. compound where an influential Muslim cleric lives in exile

Copyright 2026 Hizmet News