9 journalists of Turkey's oldest paper arrested
Xinhua, November 5, 2016 Adjust font size:
An Istanbul court ordered on Saturday the arrest of nine journalists of Turkey's oldest and opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet over their suspected links to terror groups, local media reported.
The daily's editor in chief Murat Sabuncu and others were accused by the court of "committing crimes on behalf of the Fethullahist Terror Organization (FETO) and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)," the Hurriyet daily reported.
Ankara has blamed FETO and its leader, the U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, for orchestrating a failed coup in July, while the security forces are fighting PKK mainly in Turkey's southeast.
The ordered arrest of Sabuncu and his colleagues, who were detained earlier this week for questioning, came one day after the Turkish authorities arrested the co-chairs of the pro-Kurdish People's Democratic Party, Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag, and seven lawmakers from the party, which is the third largest in parliament. Endit