Ankara issues detention orders as it targets those in judicial services over links to the Gulen Movement

Detention orders have been issued in 37 provinces for 126 people who are employed in the Turkish judicial system.

The orders were issued by the Istanbul Chief Prosecutor Office as they pursue terror charges against the accused.

They are accused of having links with the Gulen Movement, which is blamed for orchestrating a July 2016 failed coup attempt and deemed a terrorist organization by Ankara. The movement denies the allegations and accuses Ankara of performing extrajudicial mass oppression on its alleged affiliates.

According to the prosecutor, the detention orders target 108 lawyers on active duty, judges and prosecutor candidates who were previously dismissed from their posts in the wake of the post-coup crackdown, during which thousands of prosecutors and judges were sacked.

Ankara chief prosecutor’s office, in a separate operation on Friday, said it ordered the detention of 18 engineers with alleged links to the Gulen movement.

Nearly 80,000 people have been detained or arrested since the coup, while a total number of more than 511,000 people have been prosecuted due to alleged links to the movement, according to the Interior Ministry.

Authorities declared they have suspended or sacked over 150,000 civil servants and security personnel while wowing to continue widespread arrests.

Turkey’s Western allies, the European Union and the United States, have criticized the crackdown, accusing President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of using the coup as a veil to eliminate his dissidents.

Family lives in terror as they are wrongly accused of being members of the Gulen movement

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from IPA NEWS https://ipa.news/2019/03/22/ankara-issues-detention-orders-as-it-targets-those-in-judicial-services-over-links-to-the-gulen-movement/