Turkish government–Gülen movement conflict

A Turkish court April 25 sentenced Osman Kavala- a Turkish businessman who is accused of financing 2013 anti-government protests and playing a role in the 2016 coup attempt- to life in jail.

The panel of three judges also sentenced seven other less prominent defendants to 18 years in jail each on charges of aiding the attempt to topple the government.

Police arrested a Turkish man possessing weapons & a list of supporters of the Gulen movement, which the Turkey has labeled “terrorists”

The government's priority in the new legislative year is to continue to reform the entire judicial system in order to upgrade rule of law and democracy in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said, urging the judges and prosecutors to listen only to their conscience while doing their job.

The former district governors were detained on the beginning of April  on charges of links to the Gulen movement

A Turkish flag  in Istanbul, May 2020. Photo: EPA-EFE/ERDEM SAHIN

Prosecutors in the cities of Izmir and Ankara ordered the arrests based on information from the Turkish National Intelligence Agency, alleging that the suspects have links to US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who is accused by Ankara of mounting a failed coup in 2016.

Arrested soldiers who participated in the 2016 attempted coup d'etat in Turkey, are accompany by Turkish soldiers as they arrive at the court inside of the Sincan Prison before trial in Ankara, Turkey, 01 August 2017. Photo: EPA/TUMAY BERKIN

A Turkish court sentenced hundreds of military and civilian personnel at an air base to life prison sentences Thursday, proclaiming them guilty of involvement in the 2016 failed coup attempt against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government.

Turkish police and security forces have so far detained 177 soldiers in nationwide operations to arrest alleged members of Fethullah Gulen's network, which Ankara accuse of orchestrating a failed coup attempt in 2016.

Greece's government spokesman on Monday reacted to a report published by a Turkish magazine last week which described Istanbul-based Patriarch Vartholomaios as an "associate" of US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen.

Turkey has been conducting secret missions in refugee camps and other places in Greece to gather information about critics of the Turkish government and supporters of self-exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen, who have taken refuge in Greece, according to a publication by the Nordic Monitor website.