[Event of the week]
Former force commanders detained in largest Ergenekon wave

Retired Air Forces Commander Gen. İbrahim Fırtına, who was interrogated earlier in January by prosecutors conducting the investigation into Ergenekon, was detained in addition to former retired Naval Forces Adm. Özden Örnek, the writer of detailed journals kept between 2000-2004 on some of the force commanders’ coup plans, former 1st Army Commander Gen. Ergin Saygun, Gen. Engin Alan and several retired colonels.

Fırtına was detained in Ankara, where the police raided 14 locations.

The İstanbul 10th High Criminal Court arrested and put 12 senior military officers behind bars on Wednesday. Two of those arrested were admirals on active duty. The suspects stand accused of “attempting to overthrow the government of the Republic of Turkey by using force and violence,” a crime under Turkish Penal Code (TCK) Article 312, and “membership in an armed terrorist organization,” criminalized under TCK Article 314.

Fifteen more military officers, including seven on active duty, were arrested as part of the probe. Retired Adm. Ali Feyyaz Öğütçü,  retired Gen. Çetin Doğan and Ret. Gen. Engin Alan were among the arrested.

The two former force commanders, Örnek and Fırtına, were brought to the Beşiktaş Courthouse on Thursday morning to testify to prosecutors. They were released on the same day.

Opinion leaders described the latest wave of detentions as a step towards demilitarization of the country through a confrontation with those involved in subversive plans.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan asked artists to support the government’s democratic initiative, which aims to improve standards of democracy, freedom and respect for human rights in Turkey. The request was well received, with Erdoğan hosting the country’s leading artists on Saturday for a breakfast at the Prime Ministry and urging them to help spread the idea and feeling behind the widely acclaimed initiative to the most distant corners of the country through their work.

Feb. 21 Sunday

Former Van prosecutor Ferhat Sarıkaya, who was disbarred by a higher judiciary body after indicting a top general, said that opening up the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors’ (HSYK) decisions to judicial review would not only help democratize the country’s judicial system but also save Turkey from having to pay compensation in international court decisions.

Prime Minister Erdoğan announced that his Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government plans to bring a comprehensive judicial reform package to Parliament after government officials put the finishing touches on it.

Feb. 22 Monday

Eleven retired generals and several retired colonels were detained as part of the investigation into the Sledgehammer and Cage alleged coup plots, devised by military members of Ergenekon, a clandestine gang charged with plotting to overthrow the government. Nearly 50 people were detained, a majority of them retired and active duty military officers.

Documents related to former Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit’s 2002 stay at Başkent University Hospital in Ankara reached the İstanbul 13th High Criminal Court, which is hearing the Ergenekon trial.

İstanbul Chief Public Prosecutor Aykut Cengiz Engin announced that the case file on the investigation into a jailed chief public prosecutor has been sent back to Erzurum after his prosecutor’s office found that they lacked the jurisdiction to act on the file. According to Engin, two prosecutors working on the investigation into Ergenekon examined the file but decided to send it back to Erzurum prosecutors after determining that the investigation fell outside their jurisdiction.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ruled against Turkey in the case of Ahmet Arslan and Others v. Turkey, which dealt with the criminal conviction of members of a religious group called the Aczimendi Tarikatı (a religious order) for their manner of dressing in public.

Feb. 23 Tuesday

President Abdullah Gül hosted the heads of the Supreme Court of Appeals and the Council of State, Hasan Gerçeker and Mustafa Birden, separately, exchanging views with them on judicial reform, for which Gül had earlier expressed an urgent need. After he left the meeting Gerçeker confirmed that the president had asked his opinion on judicial reform.

Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal devoted his speech at his party’s parliamentary group meeting to the detention of nearly 50 members of the military as part of a probe into suspected coup plots, complaining that such detentions are unprecedented not only in Turkey but also in the world. “Military and force commanders have been detained for the first time in Turkey. Dear friends, such a comprehensive operation has not occurred in the world before. No such thing has ever occurred. No democratic country has ever witnessed such a thing,” he noted.

Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli said the process that started last week with an HSYK decision and was followed by the detention of dozens of military members as part of a probe into an illegal gang constitutes a crisis in the state.

A retired military officer in Çanakkale’s Gelibolu district shot his wife and two daughters to death before turning his weapon on himself, reports from the area said. Police, responding to news of gunshots in the Hocahamza neighborhood, found that retired Lt. Col. Süleyman Oral Özçağatay had shot his wife, Hatice Canan, and the couple’s daughters, Melis and Cansu, to death before killing himself. The murders all appeared to have been committed with a single handgun.

The main opposition CHP accused European Parliament members of being misinformed by only reading certain newspapers including Today’s Zaman.

Despite the CHP’s accusations, the co-chairwoman of the EU-Turkey Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC), Hélène Flautre, called Today’s Zaman “one of the stars of the Turkish press.”

A court in Erzurum on Tuesday rejected an appeal filed by Erzincan Chief Prosecutor İlhan Cihaner’s lawyer seeking the prosecutor’s release from prison. It was the second rejection by the court. Cihaner was arrested on charges of membership in a terrorist organization and falsification of documents.

Ten suspects, including the Vatan daily’s Web site administrator, Aylin Duruoğlu, were released pending trial in the investigation into the Revolutionary Headquarters, a leftist terrorist organization behind a deadly attack that took place in İstanbul last year.

Chief of General Staff Gen. İlker Başbuğ gathered active duty military generals at an extraordinary meeting at the General Staff in the Turkish capital on Tuesday evening, reportedly to discuss the position of the armed forces in the wake of a fresh wave of detentions of nearly 50 retired and active duty members of the military as part of a coup plot investigation.

A mine explosion killed 13 workers and critically injured several others on Tuesday evening in the northwestern province of Balıkesir. The explosion, thought to have been caused by methane gas, occurred in a mine near Dursunbey, trapping workers underground.

Feb. 24 Wednesday

The İstanbul 10th High Criminal Court arrested and jailed seven senior military officers for allegedly plotting to overthrow the government. Two of those arrested were admirals on active duty.

Current Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTÜK) head Davut Dursun and Zahit Akman, a former chief and current member of the council, were each sentenced to two-and-a-half years in prison by an Ankara court over misconduct.

Ümit Boyner, the chairwoman of the Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen’s Association (TÜSİAD), and a delegation accompanying her had talks with Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç and President Abdullah Gül on Wednesday to discuss the organization’s expectations for judicial reform. Arınç received the TÜSİAD delegation at the Prime Ministry, where the delegation expressed the country’s growing expectations for judicial reform. “Turkey needs to cover a significant distance in the areas of democratization and judicial reform in order to return to its ‘regular agenda’,” Boyner remarked, in a reference to the fight against unemployment and the global financial crisis and aspirations to continue economic growth.

President Gül hosted Constitutional Court President Haşim Kılıç and Justice Minister Sadullah Ergin separately at the Çankaya presidential palace to exchange views on judicial reform, which he has described as an “urgent need” for Turkey.

Thirteen more military officers, including seven on active duty, were arrested overnight as part of a probe into the Sledgehammer plan, bringing the total number of retired and active duty officers arrested in the case thus far to 20, including five admirals and three generals.

Feb. 25 Thursday

President Gül, Gen. Başbuğ and Prime Minister Erdoğan met at an extraordinary summit at the Çankaya presidential palace in the wake of a fresh wave of detentions and arrests of senior military officers as part of a coup plot investigation.

Parliament rejected a censure motion submitted by the opposition against Interior Minister Beşir Atalay, after a long debate in Parliament. The CHP had alleged that Prime Minister Erdoğan and Atalay pressured judges not to arrest a group of terrorists who surrendered to Turkish security forces at the Habur border gate last October. The CHP’s censure motion was rejected in Parliament after fiery discussions, with 146 voting in favor and 310 voting against.

Former Chief of General Staff retired Gen. Yaşar Büyükanıt was protested by students at İstanbul’s Beykent University yesterday, where he attended a conference at the law faculty. Two students held a banner that read “No to Imperialism,” and “America, get out, this homeland is ours” when Büyükanıt entered the conference hall.

Çağrı Güler, a noncommissioned naval officer, was arrested on Thursday after he confessed to having prepared a password insulting the prime minister for soldiers posted at the military garrison and barracks in the northwestern province of Balıkesir.

Feb. 26 Friday

Eighteen members of the military, including one retired officer, were detained in a second wave of raids in 13 provinces as part of an investigation into the Sledgehammer plot. No official announcements were made initially, but news reports say those detained were mentioned as having been assigned roles in Sakal (Beard) and Çarşaf (Chador), two subplots included under the Sledgehammer plan.

Justice Minister Ergin paid visits to the heads of the Council of State, the Supreme Court of Appeals and the Constitutional Court to exchange views on a judicial reform package the government plans to introduce.

Prime Minister Erdoğan vowed to put everyone who conspired against the country’s democracy on trial, as the number of military officers charged and jailed for plotting a coup against his AK Party government in 2003 rose to 31.  That figure, which includes seven admirals and four generals, represents the largest-ever crackdown on the military, which has ousted four civilian governments since 1960.

Turkish pop star Tarkan Tevetoğlu, who goes by just his first name in the entertainment business, was detained early Friday in an anti-drug operation in İstanbul along with several other Turkish celebrities.