Betül Aygün, a 30-year-old former teacher, died of breast cancer after her treatment was significantly delayed by a prison administration during her incarceration on alleged links to the Gülen movement, Bold Medya reported on Thursday.
Aygün died in Germany, where she went after her release.
The delivery of her test results was delayed by an İzmir prison by six months, during which time the tumor aggressively grew, the report said.
Aygün later underwent two surgeries unaccompanied by family and was sent back to prison afterwards.
After arriving in Germany, she had given an interview to Bold Medya, holding the prison administration responsible for anything that might happen to her.
She had also revealed that she was repeatedly subjected to strip-searches and other abusive practices while in prison.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been targeting followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by Turkish Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since the corruption investigations of December 17-25, 2013, which implicated then-prime minister Erdoğan, his family members and his inner circle.
Dismissing the investigations as a Gülenist coup and conspiracy against his government, Erdoğan designated the movement as a terrorist organization and began to target its members. He intensified the crackdown on the movement following an abortive putsch in 2016 that he accused Gülen of masterminding. Gülen and the movement strongly deny involvement in the coup attempt or any terrorist activity.
In addition to the thousands who were jailed, scores of other Gülen movement followers had to flee Turkey to avoid the government crackdown.
