Turkish police detain 35 lawyers for ‘defending’ Gülen sympathizers
Date posted: March 23, 2017
Turkish police on Thursday detained 35 lawyers who are defending suspects accused of links to the Gülen movement in several ongoing trials.
Arrest warrants were issued for 80 lawyers, and 35 of them were detained in house raids across Turkey.
The arrest warrants target lawyers including those defending imprisoned journalist Hidayet Karaca, the former head of the now-shut-down Samanyolu TV station; exiled businessman Akın İpek; the former chief executive of Bank Asya; and some jailed police officers.
[This latest move against the Gulen sympathizers is a violation of a basic right of the suspects, who are still legally innocent until proven guilty, to defend themselves at the courts. Considering neither the lawyers nor the suspects have access to the indictments, it is clear that Erdogan regime leaves the suspects no room to defend themselves at the courts. (This paragraph added by HN)]
Turkey has been conducting a massive crackdown against real and perceived sympathizers of the Gülen movement that gained momentum particularly after a failed coup on July 15.
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It seems like this season is a season for losing fathers. Yesterday, like many friends around me, I too lost my father. All fathers are great, but mine was different, an extraordinarily good person. He had a finger in every innovation that was brought to the village. Although he never went to school, he could speak and write in Ottoman and [modern] Turkish. He would read history books for the curious in the house.
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