Two senior retired generals will face trial accused of plotting to overthrow Turkey’s government, after an Istanbul court agreed on Wednesday to hear a case linking 56 more people to a clandestine group of ultranationalists.
Liberals hope the widening investigation into the network, known as Ergenekon, will mark an end to a “deep state” culture of military coups and mysterious killings masterminded by well-connected bureaucrats, officers and civilians.
Prosecutors are seeking life imprisonment for Sener Eruygur and Hursit Tolon, retired four star generals and, respectively, the former head of the paramilitary gendarmerie and the former army commander, charging them with founding a terrorist group to overthrow parliament.
A copy of the indictment was published on Wednesday. The court will begin hearing the case on July 20 and decide whether to merge it with the continuing trial, according to the Anatolian news agency.
Eighty six people, many known for their strong nationalist views and opposition to the governing Justice and Development party, are charged with belonging to an organisation that planned bombings and assassinations to provoke a military coup.
But Wednesday's indictment is more explicitly political, suggesting the prosecutor is willing to delve into the events surrounding Abdullah Gul’s appointment as president in 2007, when secularists organised demonstrations to protest at the choice of a politician who was once overtly Islamist. It also reaches senior levels of a military previously all but immune from prosecution.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
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