Turkish general and prosecutor charged in anti-government plot

Istanbul - A four-star Turkish general and a prosecutor have been charged with involvement in an alleged plot to discredit the Turkish government and a powerful Islamic movement considered close to it, local media reported Tuesday. The indictment, submitted to a court in the eastern city of Erzincan, charges a dozen others, including military and intelligence personnel, with being part of the plan.

The investigation is connected with an ongoing trial into another alleged coup plot, known as "Ergenekon."

The indictment comes in the wake of last week's arrest of nearly 50 active and retired military officers in connection with a separate alleged effort - codenamed Sledgehammer - to undermine Turkey's liberal Islamic Justice and Development Party (AKP) government in 2003.

The indictment claims General Saldiray Berk and Erzincan's chief prosecutor Ilhan Cihaner are linked to the Ergenekon plot and charges them with being members of a "terrorist organization," according to the state-run Anatolia Agency.

The indictment claims Berk and Cihaner were part of a group that planned to plant weapons and other incriminating evidence in student houses run by the Fethullah Gulen movement, a Turkish Islamic group considered to have close ties to the AKP.

A document leaked last June, allegedly written by a Turkish naval officer, suggested targeting the Gulen movement as one of the ways of discrediting the AKP. The military initially denied the document originated from within its ranks, but recently said it may in fact be genuine.

The arrest of Cihaner has led to increased tension between Turkey's judiciary and the government and to charges that the AKP is interfering with the judiciary's independence.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/312064,turkish-general-and-prosecutor-charged-in-anti-government-plot.html.