Prime Minister Erdogan is trying to pacify an increasingly irate public with measures that have raised a few eyebrows. He has in fact expressed his assent to a possible retrial of hundreds of military officers previously found guilty of planning a coup, a move seen by many at the time as preemptive to his legislative effort to curtail constitutional military powers.
Although the appeals court in October had upheld the convictions of the top officers that were accused of plotting the overthrow of the Erdogan administration, the new trial would revaluate the legal basis, and not so much seek to assert the innocence of the military officer, according to Erdogan's own statements.
The military however, has brought the appeal that would enable the retrial on the basis that evidence against the military officer was fabricated.
The Erdogan administration is now in a very vulnerable spot, and the military are seizing the occasion to make their voice, and plight, heard.
More than 300 active and retired military were sentenced to often lengthy prison terms by the Erdogan coup trial. The sentences came on the heels of indictments which purported to show that a military exercise called 'sledgehammer' was in fact a preparatory exercise to a full out military coup in 2003.
Source : Al Jazeera/ 1.6.14
No comments:
Post a Comment