Police monitored entire nation: Turkish main opposition

ANKARA

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Turkey’s government authorized the police to keep records on the entire nation following a request by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his family members, according to the country’s main opposition.

“I have an indictment here, issued by an Ankara prosecutor. The victims are Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his family. What the prosecutor says is that the ‘Intelligence Unit of the Police Department has collected intelligence about everybody in Turkey on a virtual platform through detailed data analysis,’” Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, leader of the Republican People’s Party (CHP), said in an address to his parliamentary group March 17. 

“We knew we have been profiled, but why are you profiling 77 million? You profile politicians, OK, but why are you profiling a taxi driver? They profile 77 million,” he said.

Underlining that the law stipulated that the police could collect and assess intelligence only to protect the unity of the state as a pre-emptive measure, Kılıçdaroğlu said keeping records on the entire nation was a clear violation of laws.

“The journalists didn’t ask you. But I’m asking now. Give me an answer: What are you going to do with the personal information of 77 million?” Kılıçdaroğlu asked Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu on March 17.

“If you wonder about my personal life, come and I will tell you about it. But why do you want to learn about the private lives of citizens? On what grounds are you keeping the information [about citizens]? There is no such thing in the law,” he said.

Criticizing journalists for not asking this question to Davutoğlu, Kılıçdaroğlu said: “Why don’t you ask it, my friends? I have been told that the questions to be given to Davutoğlu are prepared in advance and that’s how they are asked. If Davutoğlu is really doing something like that, he should immediately leave his office.”

The CHP leader said profiling people’s private lives was immoral and that even some high-level government officials, including Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç, had admitted the spying in the past.