Hundreds held over links

Police launched simultaneous operations across Turkey yesterday, detaining hundreds of people with suspected links to USbased cleric Fethullah Gulen.

Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said 1,009 people have been held so far in raids in all of the country’s 81 provinces, describing it as an “important step” towards the government’s aim of “bringing down” the Gulen movement.

The suspects are allegedly Gulen operatives who directed followers within the police force.

Mr Soylu said the individuals allegedly “infiltrated the police, tried to lead it from the outside by forming an alternative structure, ignoring the state”.

Some 8,500 police officers participated in the operation, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

The detentions are part of a widespread crackdown following last summer’s failed coup attempt, which Turkey says was orchestrated by Gulen’s movement. More than 47,000 people have been arrested since the coup, Mr Soylu has said, including some 10,700 police officers and 7,400 military personnel.

Gulen has denied orchestrating the coup. Turkey is pressing the United States to extradite him. Japan’s disaster reconstruction minister has resigned after saying “it was good” that the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami hit a northern region instead of areas closer to Tokyo.

Prime minister Shinzo Abe accepted Masahiro Imamura’s resignation yesterday.

He was replaced by Masayoshi Yoshino, the former deputy environment minister from Fukushima.

The tsunami and the quake killed more than 18,000 people across northern Japan.

Mr Imamura’s resignation comes a day after he made the remark in a speech at a ruling party reception.

According to Kyodo news, Mr Imamura said: “It was good that (the disaster) hit the Tohoku region, up there. There would have been a massive, enormous damage had it occurred closer to the capital region.”

Masahiro Imamura