TheCable

BY YAHAYA ETILA

I love Turkey: the food, the tea, and the warm hospitality. What is happening to Turkey is a question to which I have been searching for answers. But none seems to be in sight.

“Ne Mutlu Türküm diyene” in English translates to “How happy is the one who says I am a Turk!”. This is the motto of the Republic of Turkey. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk used this phrase in his speech for the 10th Anniversary of the Republic of Turkey on October 29, 1933 (Republic Day), for the first time. In 1972, the Turkish Ministry of National Education added this phrase to the Student Oath.

The oath was annulled in 2013 before the Council of State reinstated it in 2018. However, the Turkish Ministry of Education appealed against the order, and the Council of State repealed the Student Oath in 2022 again.

What is happening to Turkey? There seems to be a lot that we do not know—the failed coup, and the purges that followed. Fethullah Gulen, the cleric behind the Hizmet Movement, has been accused as the man behind the coup. This has had severe consequences for the country’s economy and for Turks.

I was heartbroken when I read about the cancellation of Turkey’s oldest film festival amid controversy surrounding a documentary about the aftermath of a 2016 coup attempt, which was deemed too sensitive.

The Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival, also known as Antalya International Film Festival, has been held annually since 1963 in Antalya and is Turkey’s most important film festival. The festival, which started in 1963 as the Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival, is one of the deepest-rooted festivals in Europe and Asia and one of Turkey’s oldest and longest-running film festivals.

What was the reason for the cancellation? Turkish Culture and Tourism Ministry withdrew its support for the event after objecting to the film “Kanun Hükmü” or “The Decree,” a documentary that focuses on the hardships of a teacher and a doctor who were dismissed from their jobs following an attempted coup in Turkey on July 15, 2016.

“It is unfortunate that in such an important festival, the power of art is used to make propaganda for the FETO terrorist organization through the perception of victimhood,” the Culture Ministry said.

What is FETO, and why would such a historical and essential film festival be canceled because of an organization? And who are FETO members? According to the Turkish government, FETO is the Fetullah Gulen Terrorist Organization responsible for the failed coup in Turkey in 2016.

Let’s go back in history. In the aftermath of the failed coup attempt in Turkey, the Turkish government has blamed Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish cleric who has lived in self-imposed exile in the state of Pennsylvania in the U.S. since 1999, for plotting the coup with his followers.

Fethullah Gulen, the inspirer of the Movement, has denied this allegation. He called for an international investigation, and if found culpable, he would turn himself in for prosecution from his base in the United States of America.

It’s been eight years and still counting, and there has not been any link to Fethullah Gulen or Hizmet. However, the persecution of Hizemt Movement members continued unabated, with hundreds of thousands, if not millions, either sacked from their jobs or their businesses closed down in Turkey and other parts of the world.

This takes us back to the documentary that was responsible for the cancellation of the Orange Film Festival. The Decree is a documentary telling the struggle of Doctor Yasemin and Teacher Engin after losing their jobs via Decree Law. Yasemin and Engin have been driven out of society and pushed into loneliness. They still want to return to their duties despite all the difficulties. But all their efforts are lost in the legal labyrinths of the state.

This documentary highlights Hizmet Movement volunteers’ challenges in the aftermath of the failed coup. Since the coup attempt, Turkey has demanded the extradition of Fethullah Gulen and his affiliates in the U.S. and the shutting down Gulen-affiliated schools and businesses abroad.

In a feature story by the New York Times Magazine published in 2017, titled Inside Turkeys Purge, it stated that “In the A.K. Party’s view, anyone devoted to Gulen, the man accused of being behind the coup attempt, is assumed to do whatever he says, and so all Gulenists, even teachers and tradesmen who couldn’t possibly have been involved, can also legally be considered terrorists, or members of FETO.”

However, there is a new twist. In a press release by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) titled “Turkey must address the systemic problem of conviction for terrorism offenses based decisively on the accused use of by-lock messaging app.”

The case concerned the conviction of a former teacher, a Hizmet Movement volunteer, and considered by the Turkish authorities as being behind the attempted coup of July 15, 2016, vide Yuskel Yalcinkaya vs. Turkiye, application number 15669/20. The court ruled that there had been a violation of Article 11 (freedom of assembly and association) of the Convention.

The court said its ruling on the conviction of Yuksel Yalcinkaya, a former teacher, could apply to thousands of other Turks who were jailed following a 2016 failed coup attempt that Turkey blames on followers of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen.

Mr. Yuskel Yalcinkaya’s conviction had been based decisively on using the encrypted messaging app called by-lock, which the domestic courts in Turkey held had been designed for the exclusive use of “FETO” members. Indeed, the implication is that anyone who used the app could, in principle, be convicted alone of membership in a terrorist organization.

The court held that such a uniform and global approach by the Turkish judiciary departed from the requirements laid down in international law concerning the offense in question and was contrary to the object and purpose of Article 7, which is to provide adequate safeguards against arbitrary prosecution, conviction, and punishment.

The court said that additional evidence against Yalcinkaya included his use of an account at Bank Asya, a lender started by Gulen followers and seized by the government in 2015, and his membership in a trade union and educators’ group that Turkey says are affiliated with the cleric.

The judgment implies that hundreds of thousands of Hizemt Movement volunteers have been unjustifiably languishing in jail and their businesses ruined. It was indeed severe. According to statistics, In the business sector, the government forcefully seized assets of over a thousand companies worth $50–60 billion on the charge of being related to Gülen and the coup. Goods and services produced by such companies were subject to boycott by the public.

The most significant purge was in the Ministry of National Education, where 15,200 education ministry officials were suspended. The licenses of 21,000 teachers in the private sector were also canceled. The Council of Higher Education asked all deans of state and private universities, numbering 1577, to resign. Six hundred twenty-six educational institutions, primarily private, were shut down.

According to Amnesty International, during the July 2016 purges, detainees were denied food for up to three days and water for up to two days, were denied medical treatment, were reportedly raped with police truncheons or fingers, and were subjected to other forms of torture. Amnesty said that three hundred male soldiers held in the Ankara police headquarters were beaten during their detention, with injuries including bruises, cuts, and broken bones.

Between July 2016 and June 2019, out of more than 1,500 prosecuted lawyers, 599 were arrested, and 311 were sentenced to an average of six years in prison. Thirty-four lawyers’ associations in Turkey were shut down, and lawyers were forced to testify against their clients. And the list goes on.

Has the Turkish economy fared well since the 2016 purges that have seen hundreds of thousands in jail and out of jobs? Have the Turkish authorities provided tangible evidence that Fethullah Gulen and Hizmet Movement were responsible for the coup attempt? Are Hizmet Movement volunteers victims of political persecution? Ne mutlu Türk’üm diyene?

Etila is an international relations expert.