ANKARA: Documents seized by Turkish police indicate that a shadowy, ultra-nationalist illegal organization planned to trigger a coup to unseat the Turkish government, newspapers reported yesterday. The documents detailed a four-point plan, including launching illegal protests on July 7 across 40 provinces, sparking clashes with security forces and publishing fake documents showing a worsening economy, said the newspaper Sabah.
Police detained 21 people on Tuesday, including two retired senior generals, journalists and politicians, for links to a group known as Ergenekon suspected of trying to engineer a military takeover. All were critics of the government. They have not yet been charged, but Istanbul’s chief prosecutor’s office has prepared an indictment against more than 40 other people arrested over the past 12 months as part of the same probe.
“Ergenekon may be a criminal organization, and so should be prosecuted, but with its sloppy organization and old men in charge it remains highly doubtful this was anything very serious,” said Gareth Jenkins, an Istanbul-based expert on Turkish security issues. The documents, also published in Yeni Safak, come as the governing AK Party defended itself in court against charges of trying to establish an Islamic state. The party could be closed down, a move that might lead to an early parliamentary election. “We will try to finish (our oral defense) today,” AK Party deputy group Chairman Bekir Bozdag told reporters outside the Constitutional Court. The chief prosecutor of the Court of Appeals also wants 71 leading political figures, including Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, banned from party membership for five years.
Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek made no statement as he arrived at the Constitutional Court. The court is to appoint a rapporteur to pen a nonbinding recommendation on a verdict. The judges will then set a date to debate the case behind closed doors before making a ruling.
Chief Prosecutor Abdurrahman Yalcinkaya launched his case against the AKP in March, saying it should be banned for seeking to replace Turkey’s secular system with Shariah law. Yalcinkaya argued his case before the court on Tuesday.
Turkish assets fell yesterday as the two events unnerved investors, who fear prolonged political tensions in the European Union-applicant country.
Turkey has had four military coups in the last 50 years. Turkey’s second most powerful commander called for calm on Wednesday and the AK Party said everyone must let the judiciary do its job.
“There is a suspicion in society that it is turning out to be a political revenge process rather than a legal process,” said Turkey’s main opposition leader Deniz Baykal.
