Zeki Güven, former intelligence chief of the Ankara Police Department who was arrested as part of Turkish government’s massive post-coup witch hunt campaign targeting alleged members of the Gülen movement, was found dead on his bed at the Sincan No 1 F Type Prison on Sunday.
According to the reports in Turkish media, Turkish authorities have started an investigation about suspicious death of Güven. Güven and his wife, judge Sevda Güven, were detained on May 22, 2018 in a shopping mall in Eskişehir province over their alleged links to the Gülen movement.
According to Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency, detention warrants issued by Ankara’s 2nd, 4th and 14th high criminal courts were outstanding for Zeki Güven over his alleged involvement in the revelation of a sex scandal concerning Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party’s (CHP) leader Deniz Baykal in 2010. Judge Sevda Güven is also reportedly wanted over alleged membership in the Gülen movement.
The Stockholm Center for Freedom (SCF) reported in one of its studies titled “Suspicious Deaths and Suicides In Turkey” that there has been an increase in the number of suspicious deaths in Turkey, most in jails and detention centers, where torture and ill-treatment are being practiced. In the majority of cases, authorities concluded they were suicides without any effective, independent investigation.
Suspicious deaths have also taken place beyond prison walls amid psychological pressure and threats of imminent imprisonment and torture, sometimes following the release of suspects or just before their detention. SCF has compiled 114 cases of suspicious deaths and suicides in Turkey in a list in a searchable database format.
Turkey survived a controversial military coup attempt on July 15, 2016 that killed 249 people. Immediately after the putsch, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government along with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan pinned the blame on the Gülen movement.
Fethullah Gülen, who inspired the movement, strongly denied having any role in the failed coup and called for an international investigation into it, but President Erdoğan — calling the coup attempt “a gift from God” — and the government initiated a widespread purge aimed at cleansing sympathizers of the movement from within state institutions, dehumanizing its popular figures and putting them in custody.
Turkey has suspended or dismissed more than 150,000 judges, teachers, police and civil servants since July 15. On December 13, 2017 the Justice Ministry announced that 169,013 people have been the subject of legal proceedings on coup charges since the failed coup.
Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu announced on April 18, 2018 that the Turkish government had jailed 77,081 people between July 15, 2016 and April 11, 2018 over alleged links to the Gülen movement.
The post Zeki Güven, jailed police intelligence chief, victim of suspicious death in Turkish prison appeared first on Stockholm Center for Freedom.
from Stockholm Center for Freedom https://stockholmcf.org/zeki-guven-jailed-police-intelligence-chief-victim-of-suspicious-death-in-turkish-prison/
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