Former rector of the Antalya-based Akdeniz University, Professor İsrafil Kurtcephe, has been detained over alleged links to the faith-based Gülen movement.
Kurtcephe was detained at his Antalya home on Friday as part of an investigation into the Gülen movement, which is accused by the Turkish government of masterminding a failed coup attempt.
The professor served as Akdeniz University’s rector between August 2008 and November 2015.
The coup attempt on July 15 killed over 240 people and wounded more than a thousand others. Immediately after the putsch, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government along with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan pinned the blame on the Gülen movement.
Fethullah Gülen, who inspired the movement, strongly denied having any role in the failed coup and called for an international investigation into it, but President Erdoğan — calling the coup attempt “a gift from God” — and the government initiated a widespread purge aimed at cleansing sympathizers of the movement from within state institutions, dehumanizing its popular figures and putting them in custody.
According to a statement from Turkish Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ on May 6, 149,833 people have been investigated and 48,636 have been jailed as part of an investigation targeting the Gülen movement since the July 15 coup attempt in Turkey.