
A number of TV and radio stations that were closed down by the government in the aftermath of a failed coup attempt on July 15 due to their links to the faith-based Gülen movement have been sold to the pro-government Turkuvaz Media Group without a tender.

“I heard all kinds of curse and swearing against my family during the interrogation. They threatened me with raping my family members. I saw one man who had a black eye on his eyes. I witnessed another man as having difficulty in walking because police shoved a baton into his anus. So many victims have marks in their bodies from abuse and torture.”

The 12-year-old T.K. has claimed asylum with the United Nations (UN) office in Saudi Arabia alone after his/her father was detained by Saudi officials as part of what many say President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ever-growing witch-hunt against the Gulen movement that has spread to overseas in the recent past.

The recent politically motivated kidnapping incidents backed by the Turkish authorities which targeted the followers of Gulen movement in Malaysia raise serious questions about the standards of the rule of law, civil liberties, the individual rights and quality of the political system of Malaysia.

A Supreme Court of Appeals member until he was dismissed, Mustafa Erdogan has been kept in a holding cell at a private hospital since Dec. 30, 2016. His daughter Buket Erdogan said the top judge was denied right to “trial without arrest” although he was paralysed after a surgery on his brain.

Karaman, who was the principle of a prestigious international school that promotes critical thinking as well as holding his post with the Malaysian-Turkish Dialogue Society, does not fit the stereotypical profile of an Isis operative.

A school principal and a businessman have disappeared in the latest in a string of international arrests allegedly ordered by Turkey in a post-coup crackdown that has seen more than 100,000 people detained. Human rights group warns pair could be tortured if they are extradited back to Turkey.