Turkey Crackdown Continues

Turkish police detained 53 former employees of the Istanbul Stock Exchange on Friday over alleged links to the US-based cleric accused of orchestrating last July’s attempted coup.

Prosecutors have ordered the detention of 102 people as part of the investigation. Ankara has blamed the network of the cleric Fethullah Gulen for the failed coup. Gulen has denied involvement, Reuters reported.

Dawn raids were launched on 70 addresses, targeting suspects who were removed from their posts at Borsa Istanbul in the wake of the attempted putsch on July 15, 2016.

Some 49,000 people have been formally arrested in relation to the failed coup, out of 150,000 people investigated. About 145,000 civil servants, security personnel and academics have also been suspended or sacked as part of a related purge.

These arrests have affected all strata and raised European concerns about a wave of authoritarianism drowning any democratic voice of dissent.

Turkish police arrested the online editor of Cumhuriyet newspaper on Friday, an unidentified police official said.

Oguz Guven, the editor-in-chief of Cumhuriyet.com.tr, was taken to Istanbul police headquarters, the official said on condition of anonymity due to restrictions on talking to the media.

The official said an arrest warrant was issued for Guven after the online edition published an article about the death of Mustafa Alper, Denizli Province’s chief prosecutor who was killed in a car crash on Wednesday.

Early on Friday, Guven tweeted, “I am being taken into custody”, without elaborating further.

A statement on Cumhuriyet’s website said the newspaper was not given reasons for Guven’s arrest.

According to state-run Anadolu Agency, 12 Cumhuriyet journalists and executives are currently in prison facing “terror” charges.

Scores of opposition media organizations have been shut down since the government acquired emergency powers following the failed coup last year.

Cumhuriyet, known for its independent reporting, received international attention in 2015 when it reported on a fleet of Syria-bound trucks, allegedly sent by the country’s intelligence agency, carrying weapons to Syrian anti-government fighters.

For that report, Can Dundar, Cumhuriyet’s previous editor-in-chief, was sentenced to nearly six years for publishing state secrets.