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Prosecutors in Istanbul continued to order the detention of military men throughout the week after the first wave which sent 33 of the 49 officers detained to prison on charges of participating at plans to stage a coup against the government of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan while President Abdullah Gul asked him and Chief of Staff Gen. Ilker Basbug to a meeting at the Cankaya Presidential Residence to discuss “the serious situation” that has been created by the whole affair.
The prosecutors handling the Ergenekon case issued another list of 18 officers, almost all of them in active service to be detained by police and brought to Istanbul for questioning.
However, the former commanders of the air force and navy and the former deputy chief of staff who were detained during the first wave were freed after their questioning by the prosecutors. The decision to free them came after the meeting at the Cankaya residence after which a one-sentence announcement urged “all parties concerned to act with responsibility in order not to impair the institutions of the state.”
Erdogan was seen walking into the President’s office carrying a briefcase followed by Gen. Basbug with a similar one in his hand leading to speculation that the “warring parties” were going to settle their accounts through solid evidence. But no word was leaked out of the meeting regarding the exchanges that took place between the three leaders who are probably the only people capable of defusing the tensions or exacerbating the crisis.
Although the former commanders of the air force and the navy were released after their questioning, retired four-star general Cetin Dogan, the former commander of the 1st Army, under whose command the military exercises allegedly aiming at a coup had been staged was formally arrested and sent to prison. Retired three-star general Engin Alan who conducted the operation of PKK (Workers Party of Kurdistan) leader Abdullah Ocalan’s arrest in Kenya in 1999 was likewise arrested formally.
Later in the week warrants were issued for 18 other military men, all of them in active service except one retired non-commissioned officer. The continuing wave of detentions prompted the media ask the question whether all of the 274 officers implicated in documents related with the so-called “Sledgehammer Plan” would be detained.
“Sound of steps towards advanced democracy”
What the nation is witnessing today is “the sound of steps towards advanced democracy,” declared Erdogan to the local branch executives of his Justice and Development Party (AKP) gathered in Ankara during the weekend.
“Nobody should worry and be afraid. Turkey is progressing towards advanced democracy and a fully developed system of law. Law is functioning. The independent jurisdiction is performing its task. Nobody can be declared guilty unless the contrary is proved. But also nobody is above law. Those who are using provocative and irresponsible language are not acting for the good of this country,” said Erdogan.
But then he gave vent to his anger to “some columnists who picture Turkey as a place devastated by fire.” This time his wrath was directed to some commentaries that criticized the meeting at Cankaya.
Commentators who write articles fanning tensions in the country are responsible for falling financial indicators, Erdogan said.
“I am addressing the publishers of these newspapers. You cannot say, ‘I cannot control what the columnists are writing.’ You are paying their salaries. When it comes to complain tomorrow you won’t have any right to complain; because you are doing everything with your columnists for the economy to collapse. If the markets have fallen 6.5 points, those who are responsible for it is obvious,” said Erdogan.
The Prime Minister asked the publishers to tell such writers, “We don’t have a place for you in our shop.”
Addressing another meeting of Anatolian businessmen, Erdogan again referred to latest developments and said that the “institutions of the state were cleansing themselves.”
