Police officers detained for illegal wiretapping

MERSİN – Doğan News Agency

The prosecution lasted for 10 months before the recent operation in which 23 officers were detained. AA Photo

Twenty-three police officers were detained Oct. 28 in an investigation into the illegal wiretapping of a 123 people in the Mediterranean Turkish province of Mersin.

Police are still searching for four more officers, including the former heads of the Mersin Police Department’s intelligence branch, Ali Çengelci and Ali İhsan Kaya.

An administrative inquiry was launched by the Mersin Public Prosecutors’ Office and the police following Interior Minister Efkan Ala’s remarks, in which he said an illegal wiretapping case had emerged in a southern province.

The prosecution lasted for 10 months before the recent operation in which 23 officers were detained. Meanwhile, 16 police officers have been dismissed from their jobs after an administrative inquiry was concluded.

The officers have been accused of illegally wiretapping the city’s former governor, the deputy governor, as well as several politicians, businessmen and other officials from the security department.

The police officers reportedly wiretapped the 123 people in order to determine those who were taking part in actions of organized crime groups, to unveil those who had links with the Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party/Front (DHKP/C), the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK), the urban wing of the PKK, and a terrorist organization called “Selefi Vehhabi.”

Dozens of police officers have been arrested in waves of operations conducted over recent months. The operations are aimed at cracking down on what the government has described as a “parallel state” within the security forces, allegedly loyal to U.S.-based scholar Fethullah Gülen.