Following a failed attempted coup, Turkish officials have fired over 20,000 employees who are believed to have ties to plotters of last week’s event.
Turkey’s Ministry of Education dismissed 15,200 employees nationwide; its Interior Ministry let go of 8,777 employees; and its Board of Education requested that 1,577 university deans resign.
Over 200 officials working for Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan were also fired, along with hundreds of religious officials. In addition, Turkey’s Family and Social Policy Ministry announced that it had dismissed 393 personnel.
These firings are separate from the government detainment of around 9,000 individuals, including judges, prosecutors, security personnel, and religious figures. Well over 100 military personnel have either been questioned or will be jailed pending trial.
Either posting critical comments on social media about Erdogan, or praising the attempted coup, has led a handful of others to be arrested.
Friday night’s attempted coup saw over 200 individuals die, most of whom were government supporters.
It would appear as if this past week’s events will virtually eliminate Turkey from EU consideration.
This is in part because the death penalty, eliminated in 2004 by Turkey, is in consideration of reinstatement. European officials have stated that such a move would disqualify Turkey from joining the bloc.
Both pro-government and pro-democracy gatherings have taken place across Turkey’s major cities.
Directly impacting the U.S. is the Turkish request for America to extradite a Muslim cleric to Turkey.
While some temporary banking measures have been taken, it will be interesting to see what additional measures the Turkish government takes to prevent a full-fledged crisis.
