The İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office has prohibited individuals in Silivri Prison who are currently under arrest over their alleged links to the faith-based Gülen movement from communicating with the outside world during an ongoing state of emergency, the Sözcü daily reported on Monday.
Speaking in his Black Sea hometown of Rize on Saturday, Erdoğan repeated his unsubstantiated accusations against the Gülen movement, calling its sympathizers “terrorists.” Erdoğan urged these people under persecution to become citizens of the countries in which they are living, saying that “they will not be considered citizens of this country.”
People imprisoned as part of a government crackdown on the Gülen movement are being systematically tortured in the most barbaric ways including rape, removal of nails and the insertion of objects into their anuses, according to the president of a leading lawyers association.
In an open letter to the Turkish Parliament, six Turkey-based human rights associations on Thursday criticized recent remarks of ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) deputy Mehmet Metiner, who said the government would ignore allegations of torture and mistreatment if victims were sympathizers of the Gülen movement.
With the government praising Malaysia over its alleged deportation of three Turkish citizens due to their links to the Gülen movement, recent tips from relatives stated that they were in fact abducted by Turkish intelligence officers.
We can reasonably hope that there won’t be any large-scale bloody purges, Stalin-style. But Turkey is likely to grow further away from Europe. The convenient travel visas to the rest of Europe, which many Turks have hoped for, may be a long time away.
We strongly condemn the arrest, detention and deportation of some Nigerian students from Turkey’s capital city, Istanbul, over the botched coup in the country. The harassment and intimidation of our students by the Turkish Government over a matter that does not concern them is undiplomatic and utterly reprehensible. The Turkish government should not visit the punishment for the alleged actions of its political enemies on innocent Nigerian students.
Although Turkey immediately blamed Gulen for the coup attempt, it took Ankara nearly six weeks to make a formal request for his extradition — and that was based on earlier alleged crimes, not for his supposed role in the coup.
As a law-abiding citizen, I knew I had done nothing wrong to be stopped at the border. But in Turkey being a journalist from Zaman media group was enough for me to be considered an “enemy of the state.” And I was the editor-in-chief of Today’s Zaman which had been brutally taken over a few days earlier, earning me a suspended jail sentence for my tweets criticizing then-Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu.
As Erdogan moved on the Islamic path of authoritarianism with political ambition of becoming of leader of Muslim world, it has adversely impacted the stability of Turkey — both internally and externally. By crushing the Gulen movement it undermined the Islamic ideational resources needed most to fight Islamic terrorism.
When she returned to her old school to pick up some papers after being suspended, the religious affairs teacher from the Turkish town of Adapazari was braced for some awkward glances. But she was not prepared to be treated as an outcast by colleagues of eight years’ standing. “They wouldn’t even look at me,” says the mother-of-three, dabbing her cheek with a tissue. “It was as if I was a terrorist.”
Former Justice Robert Cordy is worried sick about the fate of the judges he helped train in Turkey and here in Boston. They have been fired, jailed, or gone missing. “It’s devastating,” he said. “I don’t think anything has ever devastated me more than seeing this happen to people that I have come to know, love, respect. It is just beyond the pale.”