The Ergenekon case exposes the power of a shadowy Islamic brotherhood that controls the Turkish police.

By Soner Cagaptay | NEWSWEEK Published May 16, 2009 From the magazine issue dated May 25, 2009
In which country does a liberal woman who educates poor girls worry about her safety when she goes home at night? Pakistan, Afghanistan-right-but also add Turkey now. In an early-morning raid on April 13, Turkish police arrested more than a dozen middle-aged liberal women working for the Society for Contemporary Life (CYDD), a nongovernmental organization that provides educational scholarships to poor teenage girls. The arrests were part of the Ergenekon court case, in which police have arrested hundreds of people, including Army officers, opponents of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government, renowned journalists, artists and now these women, charging them with plotting to overthrow the government.

When the case opened in 2007, AKP watchers saw it as an opportunity for Turkey to clean up corruption, such as security officials’ involvement in the criminal underworld. But the case is much more than that. It is a tool for the AKP to curb freedoms, and more than anything else illustrates the power of the Gülen tarikat (Islamic order) that now controls the Turkish police and, you guessed it, educational scholarships for the poor.

The Gulen tarikat emerged in Turkey in the 1970s under the charismatic leadership of Fethullah Gülen, a respected imam. While tarikats serve as brotherhoods of solidarity much like orders in the Roman Catholic Church, the Gülen tarikat suggests blending conservative Muslim values with a modern lifestyle. Most Turks have a sinister view of the spiritual message of this tarikat that I do not share. Thanks to missionary and volunteer work, the Gülen tarikat obtained social and political power globally over the decades. It has business lobbying groups and think tanks in Washington and Brussels, owns universities, banks, TV networks and newspapers around the world, and operates schools in which more than 2 million students receive education, many with full scholarships.

The tarikat gained political power in Turkey in the 1990s through its support of various political parties. In return, it gained appointments to key positions in the police and Education Ministry. Its growing power was checked in 1997 when the Turkish military issued a declaration against the then-ruling Islamist Welfare Party (RP) warning that its policies violated Turkey’s secular Constitution. Ensuing demonstrations and a media campaign brought down that government. Soon after, the Turkish courts filed a case against Gülen, alleging he was trying to take over Turkey by asking his followers to “move in the arteries of the system without anyone noticing your existence until you reach all the power centers.” Gülen left Turkey, settling in the United States.

When the AKP, established out of the RP’s ashes, came to power in 2002, the Gülen tarikat experienced a revival. It supported the AKP; in return, its members received government contracts and took charge of the police and its domestic intelligence arm. The recent arrests demonstrate the power of the Gülen tarikat: the police wiretapped liberal women, and only later asked the prosecutor to arrest them. They were questioned for days, and released without charges. Their police files, testimonies and details from their private lives were leaked to Gülen tarikat-owned media. These media described the women as members of a terrorist group and cast the CYDD’s president, Türkan Saylan, in a negative light for having been born to a mother of Christian-Swiss origins-a bothersome spin given that the Gülen tarikat’s rhetoric promotes interfaith dialogue.

Saylan, a 74-year-old cancer patient undergoing chemotherapy, was questioned and many CYDD members have since been released, but the damage to their reputations and their work in secular education is done. The case has become a show trial, helping the AKP and the Gülen tarikat pressure the liberals and tarnish their reputations. On April 26, Turkey’s justice minister said that police intelligence listens to the private conversations of 70,000 people; almost one in every 1,000 Turks lives under police scrutiny today. In the United States, that ratio is one in 137,000.

The Ergenekon case has become a witch hunt. If you have doubts, call a friend in Turkey and ask for an opinion of the case. Your friend will respond with details of the weather. The last time people were afraid to discuss a public court case in the West was during the McCarthy trials in the U.S. Though it is in accession talks with the European Union, Turkey is devolving into a similar state of fear. Sad as it is, there is a way out of this conundrum if the AKP turns Ergenekon into a case that targets only criminals, and the Gülen tarikat lets go of its control over the Turkish police and truly becomes a spiritual movement.

Cagaptay, A senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Is the author of Islam Secularism and Nationalism in Modern Turkey: Who Is a Turk? (2006).

© 2009

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TODAYS ZAMAN

Çağaptay distorts facts over Ergenekon trial in Newsweek article

Wednesday, 20 May 2009 09:21

An article that appeared in Newsweek magazine, penned by Soner Çağaptay of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, was claimed to have been full of errors and misinformation. In a piece titled “Behind Turkey’s Witch Hunt: The Ergenekon case exposes the power of a shadowy Islamic brotherhood that controls the Turkish police,” many allegations raised by Çağaptay proved to be false or misleading. Çağaptay strives to diminish the importance of the ongoing Ergenekon trial — a case in which prosecutors allege a clandestine criminal network plotted to create chaos in the country through high-profile killings, thereby inviting a military coup to overthrow the government. The investigation has so far exposed an abundance of guns and ammunition stored in hideouts, along with assassination plots against leading personalities, including Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk. Claiming that all those who were arrested and charged are opponents of the current Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government, Çağaptay argues that the government is on a witch hunt similar to that of the Joseph McCarthy-era trials in the US. He fails to note that those who have been charged with crimes during the Ergenekon investigation are naturally the “opponents” of the current government. After all, they are all charged with the crime of seeking to overthrow that government. Fact-checking Çağaptay’s allegations 1. FALSE Police investigated liberals. 1. TRUE Police investigated ultranationalists who plotted to kill leading liberals including Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk. 2. FALSE The Turkish courts filed a case against Gülen. 2. TRUE Yes, the case was filed but later dismissed. The 9th Chamber of the Supreme Court of Appeals unanimously voted to clear Gülen of all accusations against him on the grounds that “there was no certain and credible evidence showing without a reasonable doubt” that Gülen was guilty. 3. FALSE Türkan Saylan, the late chairman of the Support for Modern Life Association (ÇYDD), was interrogated by the police. 3. TRUE She was never arrested and never questioned by the police 4. FALSE Police files, testimonies and details from the private lives of those arrested were leaked to Gülen tarikat-owned media. 4. TRUE As a result of investigative journalism, many media outlets published information regarding the case. The diary of Mustafa Balbay, an ultranationalist columnist who allegedly plotted with military officers to topple the government, was published by liberal newspapers belonging to the Doğan Media Group. 5. FALSE Police listened in on private conversations. 5. TRUE Not exactly. Police can only listen in to phone conversations after obtaining approval from the prosecutor’s office that got the approval from the court in the first place. 6. FALSE The Gülen movement is a tarikat (Islamic order). 6. TRUE No such thing. Turkish courts had dismissed “tarikat” allegations and cleared Mr. Gülen of being a leader of such an order. 7. FALSE Ergenekon is a tool for the AK Party to curb freedoms. 7. TRUE Ergenekon is the first-ever civil trial of coup plotters in Turkey. 8. FALSE Although it is in accession talks with the European Union, Turkey is devolving into a similar state of fear. 8. TRUE EU officials have repeatedly lent its support to the Ergenekon case and asked for thorough investigation into any criminal activity. Çağaptay falsely states in his article that the Ergenekon case is against liberals in Turkey. In fact, the very targets of the Ergenekon ultranationalist plotters were liberals themselves, as was evident in the case of assassination plans targeting Pamuk. Some in the case are charged with being responsible for carrying out kidnappings and assassinations of liberal Kurdish intellectuals in southeastern Turkey. The sheer support of the Ergenekon trial by liberal columnists and writers in Turkey shows the case has their full backing. The author also describes the Gülen movement as a tarikat, a definition that was rejected by Fethullah Gülen, a respected Muslim scholar, himself as well as in a court of law. Çağaptay said: “The tarikat gained political power in Turkey in the 1990s through its support of various political parties. In return, it gained appointments to key positions in the police and Education Ministry.” An investigation into allegations that the Gülen community was organizing within the Turkish police was terminated without further review in 1992 by the Ankara State Security Court’s (DGM) Chief Prosecutor’s Office. It should also be noted that last year the 9th Chamber of the Supreme Court of Appeals unanimously voted to clear Gülen of all accusations against him on the grounds that “there was no certain and credible evidence showing without a reasonable doubt” that Gülen was guilty. The ruling was appealed, but the appeal was dismissed by the Supreme Court of Appeals, the statement said, noting that the acquittal ruling was confirmed beyond doubt as every legal step had been exhausted.