Barely a week after the failed coup in Turkey, the repression ordered by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is assuming worrying dimensions for the international community and fuels the suspicion that, even before the attempted coup, blacklists of authorities and workers were ready to be purged . After the hard blows inflicted on the police, the judiciary and the army, the Sultan's fist hits the world of education and information. In all, the purges (including layoffs, arrests and suspensions) would have reached 50 thousand. There is an evident climate of repression and one of the looming threats concerns women, their freedom to move around the streets with their faces uncovered and to wear Western clothes. Many reports, made by correspondents of the newspapers (from Repubblica to Corriere), refer to a growing climate of intimidation. We will soon see whether it will really lead to the application of Islamic law or not.
EDUCATION AND INFORMATION
The Higher Education Council (Yok), the constitutional body responsible for overseeing Turkish universities, has called for the resignation of all university deans, presidents and rectors. In all, 1.577 people are involved, including 1.176 employed in public universities and the rest in university foundations.
Not only that: more than 15.200 employees and officials of the Ministry of Public Education were suspended with immediate effect, while the Ministry of Education revoked the teaching license of 21 teachers working in private schools.
All teachers are suspected of links with the Feto, the religious movement headed by the preacher Fethullah Gulen and is considered a terrorist organization by the Turkish government. Gulen, exiled in the United States, was in the past an ally of Erdogan, but is now his number one enemy and immediately accused the Turkish President of having organized the (fake) coup himself only to justify the subsequent repression.
In turn, Ankara accuses Gulen of being the hidden mastermind of the coup attempt. The Turkish government has announced that it has sent Washington the dossier with the evidence against Gulen, whose extradition it is asking.
As for information, the Supreme Council for Radio and Television has revoked the broadcasting license of 24 radio or TV stations considered close to Gulen. 370 employees and journalists of the public TV Trt also ended up under investigation.
MILITARY, MINISTERIAL AND IMAM
Meanwhile, the number of people arrested on charges of being accomplices to the coup has risen to 9.322. Nine employees of the Ministry of the Interior and about three thousand judges and prosecutors were suspended from their posts. The Turkish national intelligence organization instead suspended 100 people, again on suspicion of links with Gulen's movement.
A second military adviser to Erdogan has also ended up in handcuffs: he is lieutenant colonel Erkan Kivrak, an expert in aeronautical matters, suspected of being involved in the coup. In the hierarchy of the President's advisory staff, Kivrak occupied the second place in rank and prestige.
In addition, the Turkish Presidency for Religious Affairs (Diyanet) has dismissed 492 employees, including imams and religion teachers, on the same suspicion. Islamic funerals for killed coup leaders have also been banned.
As if all this were not enough, Erdogan announced for tomorrow "an important decision" after the meeting of the National Security Council.
THE INTERNATIONAL REACTION
Internationally, alarm reactions are multiplying. Amnesty International speaks of "human rights in grave danger". The White House, on the other hand, let it be known that the president of the United States, Barack Obama, spoke on the phone with Erdogan, inviting him to respect democratic values.
The UN, on the other hand, has made it known that it also fears and condemns "the reintroduction of the death penalty: it would be a violation of Turkey's obligations under international human rights law, a big step in the wrong direction", said the High human rights commissioner, Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein.
Lastly, from Italy, the Speaker of the Chamber Laura Boldrini used words of firm condemnation: “When thousands of people are arrested arbitrarily, it is repression, and it is something intolerable for a country that says it wants to join the European Union. What is happening in Turkey should worry us and it is unacceptable”.
Meanwhile, in response to the purges, Wikileaks posted 294.548 emails online of the AKP, Erdogan's ruling party.
