A huge cleansing of Turkey’s state and other institutions is continuing as people from all walks of life find themselves hunted down and taken into custody over their alleged or real links to the Gülen movement, which the government accuses of masterminding a July 15 coup attempt.
At least 211 people were arrested while 327 others were detained on coup charges over the past 48 hours, according to Turkish news agencies.
Detentions and arrests were made in at least 18 provinces across Turkey. With most of the arrestees being civil servants, those arrested over the past day also included teachers, police officers and a dentist.
Among those detained are businessmen, nurses, civil servants, engineers, teachers and lawyers.
Turkey survived a military coup attempt on July 15 that killed over 240 people and wounded more than a thousand others. Immediately after the putsch, the government along with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan pinned the blame on the Gülen movement.
Despite Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, whose views inspired the movement, and the movement having denied the accusation, Erdoğan — calling the coup attempt “a gift from God” — and the government launched a widespread purge aimed at cleansing sympathizers of the movement from within state institutions, dehumanizing its popular figures and putting them in custody.
More than 110,000 people have been purged from state bodies, in excess of 80,000 detained and over 36,000 have been arrested since the coup attempt. Arrestees include journalists, judges, prosecutors, police and military officers, academics, governors and even a comedian. Critics argue that lists of Gülen sympathizers were drawn up prior to the coup attempt. (Turkey Purge)