Turkish police launch second operation against 'post-modern coup'
Hurriyet.com.tr
Gen Erol Özkasnak is seen at his residence in Bodrum. DHA photo
Police are conducting raids on locations in six provinces today in a fresh operation that has been launched as part of a probe into Turkey's so-called "post-modern coup" of Feb. 28, 1997.A specially authorized prosecutor in Ankara issued search warrants for addresses in Ankara, Istanbul, İzmir, Adana, Muğla, Eskişehir and Afyonkarahisar.
Detention orders were issued for numerous retired and active-duty military officers. The then-general secretary of the General Staff retired Gen. Erol Özkasnak was detained.
Gendarmerie started a search at Özkasnak's residence in the resort town of Bodrum in Muğla at around 8 a.m. Özkasnak was at his residence and invited police officers, who later arrived at the scene, into his house. The gendarmerie left Özkasnak's residence after police arrived and set up a perimeter around the dwelling. Journalists were not allowed near Özkasnak's home, reports said.
Eighteen suspects were arrested in last week's wave of detentions. Among the arrested was then-Deputy Chief of General Staff Gen. Çevik Bir.
The “post-modern coup,” or the “Feb. 28 process,” refers to a harsh army-led campaign that forced Turkey’s first Islamist prime minister, Necmettin Erbakan, to resign in June 1997 after only a year in office. The process took its name from the Feb. 28, 1997, meeting of the National Security Council (MGK), at which Turkey’s then-omnipotent military imposed a series of tough secularist demands on Erbakan that mainly aimed at curbing Islamic education in the face of what was perceived to be a growing threat to Turkey’s secular system.
