Turkey purge continues
Turkey yesterday pushed with a sweeping crackdown against suspects accused of taking part in the failed coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, extending police powers to hold people in detention and shuttering over 1,000 private schools.
A week after renegade soldiers tried to oust him with guns, tanks and F16s, Erdogan's government has rounded up or sacked tens of thousands of perceived state enemies, including almost 300 officers of the guard shielding his Ankara palace.
But in its first major release of suspects amid global criticism of the crackdown, Turkey set free 1,200 low ranking soldiers in Ankara.
In a new development, Turkey yesterday detained a nephew of US-based preacher Fethullah Gulen, state-run media reported, the first time one of the his relatives has been apprehended in the current crackdown.
Under heightened police powers, suspects can now be held without charge for one month, up from four days, the official gazette announced on the third day of what Erdogan has said would be a three-month state of emergency.
Fears that the strongman will seek to further cement his rule and muzzle dissent through repression have strained ties with Western Nato allies and cast a darkening shadow over Turkey's long-standing bid to join the European Union.
After Brussels issued stinging criticism and warned Erdogan that bringing back the death penalty would end the membership bid for good, Erdogan fired back that the EU had taken a "biased and prejudiced" stance on Turkey.
In the latest move targeting the education sector, 1,043 private schools and 1,229 associations and foundations will be shut down, said yesterday's Gazette statement.
The steps were just some of the seismic changes that have rocked Turkey since the shock of the July 15 coup attempt that claimed 246 lives.
According to the authorities, 10,410 people have been detained -- mainly soldiers, including 283 Presidential Guard officers, but also police, judges and civil servants. Of these, 4,500 have been formally placed under arrest.
The Turkish government has also cancelled over 10,000 passports, mainly of state officials, "due to flight risk with the holders either in custody or on the run".
Aside from the detentions, more than 50,000 other civil servants, down to the family and sports ministries, have been sacked or suspended -- in a purge whose speed and scale suggested to many observers that their names were on pre-existing lists.
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