“We fear there will be a witch hunt which would include journalists known as “critical” against the government”.
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“Obviously this isn’t related to journalistic activities but possible criminal conduct”, the official told CNN.
“It is absolutely imperative that the Turkish authorities halt these abhorrent practices and allow worldwide monitors to visit all these detainees in the places they are being held”, said John Dalhuisen, the organization’s Europe director.
Over 13,000 people have been detained so far in a vast sweep in the wake of the July 15 coup bid, which the authorities blame on the US-based Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen.
Some of the soldiers who seized state broadcaster TRT during the attempted coup came from the presidential guard unit, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim told Anadolu state news agency.
Some journalists said officials are intimidating them following the coup.
Campbell, 59, was “one of the top figures who organized and managed the soldiers behind the failed coup attempt in Turkey”, the conservative paper’s English-language edition said on Monday.
“We can not show mercy to those who oppressed the people”, Albayrak told CNN Turk television in an interview.
In his first decree since the state of emergency was declared, Erdogan ordered the closure of thousands of private schools, charities and foundations with suspected links to Gulen, who denies involvement in the coup.
The prosecutor said an operation was already in progress to detain the journalists but Ilicak was not found at her home in Istanbul and could be holidaying on the Aegean. Damascus accuses Ankara of fuelling the civil war by supporting Islamist insurgents and allowing foreign jihadists to cross into Syria. Newspapers allegedly sympathetic to Gulen, including Bugun and Zaman, supported investigations that were based on forged evidence, he said.
On the night to July 16, a group of insurgents took an abortive coup attempt in Turkey.
Since the coup attempt, the government has blocked 20 websites suspected of being a threat to security, including those of six news outlets and two television channels. The issue of LeMan that was banned from publication featured a cartoon on the cover of Turkish soldiers facing off against anti-coup protesters, pushed toward each other by giant hands.The magazine’s editor-in-chief, Zafer Aknar, defended the cartoon on the banned issue.
The magazine has often lampooned the government.
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During a speech to the Turkish parliament, Erdogan called Gulen, his former ally, a “dishonest traitor”.
