Turkey Arrests Nearly 1,000 in Nationwide Sweep Two Days Before 2016 Coup Anniversary

Turkish authorities launched coordinated operations across all 81 provinces on July 13 targeting nearly 1,000 suspects over alleged links to the Fethullah Terrorist Organisation. The moves came two days before the tenth anniversary of a failed military coup attempt that killed 250 people and wounded more than 2,200.

A faction of the Turkish military launched the coordinated bid to overthrow President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government at approximately 19:30 GMT on July 15, 2016.

The attempt was quashed within hours after thousands of civilians joined loyalist soldiers and police in the streets of major cities. Ankara has accused the network of United States-based Muslim scholar Fethullah Gulen of orchestrating the putsch. In the years that followed, tens of thousands of soldiers, judges, police officers, teachers and civil servants were dismissed or arrested.

Military academies were replaced by the National Defence University, command structures were overhauled and civilian oversight of the armed forces was expanded. Retired Colonel Unal Atabay said the failure of the coup rested on three pillars: the resistance of the people, resistance inside the armed forces and the institutional reflex of the military itself.

The armed forces had overthrown governments in 1960 and 1980, intervened through a memorandum in 1971 and forced an elected government from office in the 1997 post-modern coup.

The Justice and Development Party came to power in 2002 and has won every parliamentary election since, most recently retaining a majority through the People’s Alliance in 2023. Political scientist Ali Carkoglu said separation between military command and civilian politics was regarded as one of the republic’s founding principles.