Turkey Dismisses Thousands Of Civil Servants In Latest Crackdown

In latest crackdown Turkey has sacked more 10,000 civil servants and has shut down fifteen more media outlets suspecting those have links with terrorist organizations and also with the US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen.

Earlier Ankara dismissed or suspended over 100,000 people and arrested 37,000 following a failed coup earlier this year in July which President Tayyip Erdogan said Gulen masterminded.

More crackdown is learned to come in near future and thousands of teachers, academics, prison guards, health workers and forensics experts would be sacked or suspended.

Continued crackdown has raised concerns over the functioning of the government and oppositions describe the latest move as a coup in itself.

MP Sezgin Tanrikulu said, “What the government and Erdogan are doing right now is a direct coup against the rule of law and democracy.”

Tanrikulu is Member of Parliament from the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP).

Later on Sunday a court arrested formally Gultan Kisanak and Firat Anli on charges of membership of a terrorist organization. The two were co-mayors of the Kurdish southeastern city of Diyarbakir and were in detention for past five days.

Earlier hundreds of protesters marched in the city against the arrests and police used rubber pellets to disperse the people gathered in huge number.

Southeast part of the country has been rocked by heavy violence following last year’s ceasefire collapse between Turkey and Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).