A Turkish court has ordered the arrest of 17 people over alleged links to the faith-based Gülen movement, while releasing two others under judicial supervision, the state-run TRT Haber reported.
The 17 were among 25 people detained in an İstanbul operation on March 24, including seven current and four former civil servants who were dismissed by emergency decrees after a failed coup in 2016.
Six people were released after police questioning, while 19 were transferred to a magistrate court of peace, which ordered 17 jailed pending trial.
The detainees were accused of engaging in activities linked to the movement, including contacting alleged members via payphones, staying in shared student apartments allegedly affiliated with the movement, working at Gülen-linked companies, depositing money in the now-shuttered Bank Asya and using encrypted messaging app ByLock, an application once widely available on Apple’s App Store and Google Play that Turkish authorities claim was used as a secret communication tool for Gülen supporters.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has targeted followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by the late Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since corruption investigations in December 2013 implicated him as well as some members of his family and inner circle. He dismissed the probes as a Gülenist conspiracy and later designated the movement a terrorist organization in May 2016, intensifying a sweeping crackdown after a coup attempt in July of the same year that he accused Gülen of orchestrating. The movement denies involvement in the coup attempt or any terrorist activity.
According to the latest figures from the Justice Ministry, more than 126,000 people have been convicted for alleged links to the movement since 2016, with 11,085 still in prison. Legal proceedings are ongoing for over 24,000 individuals, while another 58,000 remain under active investigation nearly a decade later.
In addition to the thousands who were jailed, scores of other Gülen movement followers had to flee Turkey to avoid the government crackdown.
