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'Sledgehammer' verdicts upheld

October 9, 2013

Turkey's appeals court has upheld convictions of more than 200 military officers for plotting to topple the Turkish government. The ruling is seen as a sign of what other opponents of Prime Minister Erdogan can expect.

https://p.dw.com/p/19wXZ
epa03813609 Turkish secular protestors hold Turkish flags and shout slogans against government during a protest as Turkish gendarmes secure the area near the court building in Silivri, near Istanbul, Turkey, 05 August 2013. A Turkish court on 05 August is expected to deliver verdicts against 275 defendants accused of plotting to overthrow the moderate Islamist government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, media reports said. The defendants include military officers, journalists and academics accused of membership in Ergenekon, a right-wing underground organization that allegedly plotted to destabilize the government and stage a military coup. EPA/TOLGA BOZOGLU FREI FÜR SOCIAL MEDIA
Image: picture-alliance/dpa

The Turkish Court of Appeals in Ankara on Wednesday upheld the convictions and sentences of more than 200 military officers, including a 20-year prison term for chief suspect and former army commander Cetin Dogan, former air force commander Ibrahim Firtina and retired admiral Ozden Ornek.

More than 300 suspects were convicted in September 2012 for having conspired to topple Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AK) in 2003 in order to restructure Turkey on a nationalist footing.

Defendants in the high-profile case included army officers, lawyers, academics and journalists who faced dozens of charges with prosecutors claiming the alleged network had carried out extra-judicial killings and bombings in order to trigger a military coup.

The court on Wednesday also reversed the judgments against at least 63 other defendants and ordered their release from prison.

Wednesday's ruling was highly anticipated by other military figures, such as those found guilty earlier this year of having been part of the separate "Ergenekon" conspiracy.

Turkey's military has long played a major role in politics, having staged three coups between 1960 and 1980. It came to be seen as the guardian of the country's secular political system, founded by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, and pressured the country's first Islamic-led government out of office in 1997.

Since first coming to power in 2002, Prime Minister Erdogan's Islamist-rooted AK party has reined in army influence with a series of reforms designed to boost democracy.

The high-profile anti-conspiracy trials have exposed deep divisions in Turkish society and are seen as a key test in the decade-long conflict between Erdogan and Turkey's secularist establishment.

Critics, including the main opposition party, have said the charges against the alleged plotters are trumped up and are aimed at controlling the secularist establishment which has long dominated Turkey.

hc/rg (Reuters, AFP, AP, dpa)