Turkey’s democracy at stake
This is an edited version of an editorial in this week’s Washington Post: Autocrats often feel compelled to invent pretexts, no matter how unconvincing, for crushing their opponents. In the latest round of attacks on the news media in Turkey, warrants were issued for the arrest of journalists in which it was stated they are suspected of nefarious deeds, such as plotting “to seize state power” or forming an armed organization to support terrorists. These trumped-up claims are intended to divert attention from a crackdown by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on his critics and rivals. At stake is Turkey’s democracy.
On Dec. 14, Turkish police arrested the editor of the daily Zaman newspaper, the head of the Samanyolu broadcasting group and others.
Crowds thronged outside the newspaper headquarters in Istanbul when police arrived, and newspaper workers hoisted banners declaring that a “free press cannot be silenced.” About two dozen people were detained, including journalists, producers, scriptwriters and a police chief in eastern Turkey. Eight journalists were released Friday, but others remain in custody.
They have all been swept up into the vortex of Erdogan’s paranoia about a Sunni cleric, Fethullah Gulen. Once an ally of Erdogan, he is now branded by the president as a foe bent on toppling him from power.
The journalists’ arrests are just the most recent attempt by Erdogan to wipe out the influence that Gulen, who lives in Pennsylvania, still commands in Turkey. Erdogan appears to be hurtling toward the kind of autocracy evident today in Russia.
Erdogan declared two days before the arrests that he had uncovered evidence of a planned coup last year inspired by Gulen and his supporters.
The crisis was intensified by a corruption scandal that broke a year ago that implicated many of those close to Erdogan, then prime minister.
In the summer, he was elected president in the nation’s first popular vote for the office. Erdogan wants more power for the presidency, yet his bellicose behaviour in the past year suggests he is taking Turkey in the wrong direction.