Turkey’s gendarmerie – the latest target as post-coup purge continues

Turkey’s gendarmerie – the latest target as post-coup purge continues

ISTANBUL: -- Months after Turkey’s attempted coup, the purge is continuing.

On Monday, the opposition daily Cumhuriyet newspaper was targeted – the editor and senior staff detained, on accusations their coverage had helped precipitate what happened.

Now the interior ministry has revealed more than 1,200 gendarmerie staff have been suspended.

Ankara accuses US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen of orchestrating July’s attempted coup – and has dismissed more than 110,000 civil servants, academics, judges, police and others over suspected links to him.

Officials say the action is justified by the threat to democracy posed by Gulen’s followers.

According to a report by a member of the CHP opposition party, more than 50-thousand people were targeted in the month up to 17 September.

Over 28-thousand education staff have been removed during that period, it says.

More than 4,500 army members have gone, according to the figures.

While more than 4,200 university staff have been suspended and over 2,300 sacked.

The media has also taken a big hit in the purge. More than 2,300 journalists are said to have lost their jobs in the state of emergency, and 200 arrested.

While scores of newspapers, magazines, radio and TV stations have been closed.

The scale of the crackdown has alarmed Turkey’s Western allies and foreign investors.

Human rights groups and opposition parties say President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is using the attempted coup as a pretext to muzzle all dissent in the EU-candidate nation.

More than 240 people were killed in July, when rogue soldiers commandeered tanks and fighter jets.

 

-- © Copyright Euronews 2016-11-04