Turkish authorities have taken into custody a former provincial police chief and police officer who had evaded the authorities following their conviction of membership in a terrorist organization over alleged links to the faith-based Gülen movement, the DHA news agency reported.
The individuals, identified as İ.B., 59, the former chief of a provincial police department, and E.D., 55, a former police officer, were detained on Monday in a police operation in Kayseri province after becoming fugitives following their conviction. A court ordered their arrest, and the two were transported to prison to serve sentences of more than six years each.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting 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.
Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and a conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan began to target the movement’s members. He designated the movement as a terrorist organization in May 2016 and intensified the crackdown on it following an abortive putsch in July of the same year that he accused Gülen of masterminding. The movement strongly 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 of 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.
