A huge cleansing of Turkey’s state and other institutions is continuing as people from all walks of life find themselves hunted down and taken into custody.
A total of 4,464 people, including teachers and academics, were dismissed from their jobs with a decree issued late on Tuesday. At least 237 people have been arrested and 669 detained over the past nine days, according to Turkish news agencies.
Police carried out the operations in 67 provinces across Turkey. With most of the arrestees being civilians, those arrested over the past day also included police officers, military members, civil servants, lawyers and prosecutors.
On Feb. 3, 16 suspects including two nephews of US-based Turkish scholar Fethullah Gülen were detained as part of an investigation into the Gülen movement, which the government accuses of attempting a military coup.
Gülen’s relatives A.G. and R.G. were rounded up in a Trabzon-based police operation that also included raids in four other provinces.
On Feb. 3, trustees were appointed to the companies of 32 people who are partners in various firms in Turkey’s Aegean province of Uşak due to their alleged involvement in coup plotting.
On Feb. 3, Suay Karaman, an academic at Gazi University in Ankara and the general secretary of the Association of Academic Staff (TÜMÖD), was sentenced to 11 months, 20 days in prison, for an alleged insult to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
On Feb. 4, Turkish police used excessive force against members of the Confederation of Public Sector Trade Unions (KESK), a left-wing union, who gathered in Malatya to protest recent government decrees under which more than 100,000 public officials have been purged since a coup attempt on July 15, 2016.
On Feb. 4, 91 civilians were arrested by a Turkish court due to alleged use of a smart phone application called ByLock and links to the Gülen movement.
On Feb. 5, former assistant professor at Istanbul University’s faculty of engineering E.Ö. was detained along with his family in Turkey’s border town of Meriç as they were attempting to flee to Greece.
On Feb. 5, the co-mayors of the Doğubeyazıt district of Ağrı province in eastern Turkey, both of whom are from the pro-Kurdish Democratic Regions Party (DBP), were arrested on corruption charges.
On Feb. 6, a total of 22 lawyers were arrested by a Turkish court in an investigation targeting the Gülen movement.
On Feb. 6, an Ankara court ruled to block the website of TurkeyPurge.com without issuing prior notification, citing “legal consideration” of a law regarding crimes committed through social media.
According to a notification sent by Twitter to Turkey Purge’s official e-mail address on Feb. 6, after technical analysis and legal consideration based on Law No. 07/00195, the Ankara 3rd Criminal Court of Peace blocked access to Turkeypurge.com with decision No. 34403158-421.99.E.2635 on Jan. 13.
On Feb. 6, an Ankara court ruled for the arrest of A.Ş., A.K. and N.K. for allegedly insulting President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on social media.
On Feb. 6, 28 military officers were detained as part of ongoing operations targeting followers of the Gülen movement due to their use of a smart phone application known as ByLock.
On Feb. 7, 23 professors, all public servants, were detained as part of ongoing operations against ByLock users.
On Feb. 7, 22 out of 28 administrative and academic staff members from İstanbul Technical University (İTÜ) were arrested due to alleged links to the Gülen movement.
On Feb. 7, the Turkish government dismissed a total of 4,464 civil servants from their jobs. With a new state of emergency decree, numbered 686, 2,585 teachers, public servants from the Ministry of Education, 417 police officers from the Security General Directorate and 893 others from the Gendarmerie General Command, 80 from the Turkish Radio and Television Corporation (TRT), 48 from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 49 from the Interior Ministry and 16 from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism were dismissed.
On Feb. 7, Filiz Y., a 30-year-old woman who gave birth at Mersin City Hospital late on Feb. 6, was detained over alleged links to the Gülen movement.
On Feb. 7, a 12-year-old child died of brain cancer several months after Turkish border agents seized his and his parents’ passports at İstanbul Atatürk Airport, causing the family to abandon their plans to seek cancer treatment in Cuba.
On Feb. 9, a new government decree enabled the sale of companies seized by the state as part of an ongoing witch-hunt against critics and seeks to transfer the proceeds to the state Treasury.
On Feb. 9, 13 out of 20 high-ranking military officers who were recently detained as part of a Mardin-based operation across 12 provinces were arrested due to alleged links to the Gülen movement.
On Feb. 9, 36 employees from the Turkish Central Bank and 10 others from the Public Procurement Authority (KİK) were detained in Ankara due to their use of a smart phone application known as ByLock.
On Feb. 10, at least 11 people, including professors, were detained after police used pressurized water and pepper spray to disperse a group of protesters at Ankara University.
The group gathered in front of Ankara University to protest the recent government decree that led to the dismissal of 330 academics over coup charges.
On Feb. 10, an indictment prepared by an İstanbul prosecutor sought aggravated life sentences and an additional 15 years in jail for businessmen Mustafa Seyidoğlu and Serdar Seyidoğlu, owners of the famous Seyidoğlu Baklava chain.
On Feb. 11, nine teachers who were earlier dismissed from their posts were arrested as part of an investigation into the Gülen movement.
Turkey experienced a military coup attempt on July 15 that killed over 240 people and wounded more than a thousand others. Immediately after the putsch, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government along with President Erdoğan pinned the blame on the Gülen movement despite the lack of any evidence to that effect.
Over 135,000 people, including thousands within the military, have been purged due to their real or alleged connection to the Gülen movement since the coup attempt, according to a statement by the labor minister on Jan. 10. As of Feb. 1, 89,775 people were being held without charge, with an additional 43,885 in pre-trial detention due to their alleged links to the movement. (turkeypurge.com) Feb. 11, 2017
