Over 1,600 municipal employees linked with terrorism: Ministry

ANKARA 

More than 1,600 employees of the Istanbul Municipality have been identified as “affiliated with terrorist organizations,” Interior Ministry has said amid the investigation that opened last year.

The ministry claims that there were reports and determinations that 455 of the personnel recruited in the municipality-affiliated organizations and companies were affiliated with PKK/KCK, 80 with DHKP-C, 20 with MLKP and some with FETÖ and other organizations.

It announced in a written statement that the eight-person inspection committee identified 1,668 people who were “connected to or affiliated with terrorist organizations.”

Since the authority to evaluate whether municipal employees meet the appointment conditions or not belongs exclusively to the mayors, they will be held legally responsible if they appoint those who do not meet the conditions, it added.

The report prepared regarding the employment process was earlier submitted to the Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office. The report was delivered to the special investigation unit, the office said in a written statement.

Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu reacted to the move describing it as “a fabricated terror investigation” and said, “We have a nation with a high conscience that automatically says this is wrong.”

The investigation was opened last year with the allegation that hundreds of people recruited in the municipality were affiliated with terrorism.

Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli said that İmamoğlu should be removed from his job if found guilty, claiming Türkiye’s largest city should not be “handed over to terrorist organizations, while CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu defends him, vowing that no obstacle will prevent them from serving the people as the accusations are “baseless.”