Fethullahist Terror Organization

"I have said that 90 percent of Turks agree on only two things: That there is a God and that FETÖ [the Fethullahist Terror Organization] is behind the coup," Oğuz Kaan Salıcı told me, while speaking about the meetings of the foreign affairs commission in the United States, right after the coup. 

A former deputy mayor from Gebze, a district in Kocaeli province bordering Istanbul, was detained over his suspected links to the Fethullahist Terror Organization (FETÖ) early on Sept. 5. Orhan Sipahioğlu was detained at his house in Istanbul's Beykoz district.

The press somehow did not pay too much attention to the meeting between Prime Minister Binali Yıldıım and former Justice and Development Party (AKP) ministers.

Let me tell you about it. The former ministers will not speak outside any longer. Whatever criticism they have, they will voice it within the party. That's the most important result of the meeting. 

Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the head of Turkey's main opposition party, has complained that the ruling Justice and Development Party's (AKP) interpretation of the political unity which emerged following the July 15 failed coup attempt was only about getting the support of the opposition parties for governmental actions without considering the necessities of democracy and rule of law. 

A total of 26 former police officers, including former police chiefs, went on trial on April 19 on charges of negligence in the 2007 assassination of prominent Armenian-Turkish journalistHrant Dink that sent shockwaves around the country.

Some 38 people were detained on April 19 as police conducted simultaneous raids in 28 provinces in a probe into the allegations that suspects linked to the U.S. based Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen conspired a massive match-fixing probe.

Trustees have been appointed to 14 additional companies with "organic links" to Kaynak Holding, nearly five months after caretakers forcibly took over companies belonging to the holding for alleged ties with U.S.-based scholar Fethullah Gülen, a former government ally now considered the head of the "Fethullahist Terror Organization" (FETÖ).

For the past seven months the Turkish army and police forces have been fighting a quasi-uprising led by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in southeastern towns near the Syrian, Iraqi and Iranian borders, but on March 30 Prime Minister Ahmet Davuto?lu had a 3.5-hour meeting in Ankara on another security issue bothering the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Parti).

Before Turkish President Tayyip Erdo?an took off for his official trip to the U.S. on March 29, a reporter asked what he thought about the trial of Turkish-Iranian businessman Reza Zarrab (or R?za Sarraf, according to his Turkish passport). 

"The Zarrab case doesn't concern Turkey. Mr. Zarrab's lawyers will make his defense," Erdo?an said.

Two senior executives of Boydak Holding have been arrested for allegedly financing the group of U.S.-based scholar Fethullah Gülen, a former government ally now considered the head of the supposed "Fethullahist Terror Organization" (FETÖ) that allegedly aims to topple the government.