275 defendants, 160 witnesses, a specially built courthouse: In Turkey, a trial of the century draws to a close – the Ergenekon process. The Erdogan government uses it to intimidate political opponents and noted cold.

They came at dawn and they came with power: Anti-terror police arrested on 6 March 2011 the Turkish journalist Ahmet Sik. They stormed his publishing house and confiscated the manuscript of his new book “Army of the Imam.” Sik describes it as undermining followers of the Islamist movement of the Turkish preacher Fethullah Gülen, the Turkish state.

Sik is one of the most renowned investigative journalists in Turkey. He has revealed crimes of the Turkish mafia and the military over again in his career. But now the justice it accuses of supporting terrorism itself. Sik should be a member of the Ergenekon gang, a criminal network, named after the mythical homeland of the Turkic peoples. According to legend, used mainly by right-wing conservatives and nationalists grew Ergenekon valley approach the Turkish nation.

The Ergenekon group is said to have committed political assassinations over the years and allegedly planned to overthrow the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. 275 defendants are therefore in court, 160 witnesses were heard, many thousands of pages of documents sighted, this Monday the judgment to fall. Security forces have been specifically created for the process building cordoned off in Silivri and erected barricades, about 40 kilometers away from Istanbul.

Ergenekon Trial in Turkey:Like a century method to show trial was fair !

The journalist Sik has become the face of this highly controversial procedure. For a year he was in custody in the spring of last year, he was released, but the charges against him and dozens of other colleagues persist.

Evidence of guilt, there are not Sikhs. Observers believe the case against him for a farce. They are convinced that no such evidence of criminal machinations led to Sikhs arrest – but his revelations to the machinations of the Gülen movement, which has great influence in the conservative Islamic AK Party of Prime Minister Erdogan. Around the world, people expressed solidarity with Sik, the EU expressed concern that writers’ association PEN took the case to.

The trial of the accused began many 2008. He was originally one of the darkest chapters of recent history worked up: the crimes of an underground organization, whose members – including politicians, generals, judges – are blamed for political terror in Turkey. It was the chance to settle accounts with the shadow network of the so-called deep state.

But what began as a legitimate case against a criminal elite, has become a show trial. Some defendants sit in jail for years, their lawyers speak of manipulated evidence. As well as anyone that the government perceives as enemies may come to the attention of the investigators – Erdogan settles. In the past week, he said, would “protect gangs and mafia” before the country.

Ergenekon Trial in Turkey:”Erdogan is abusing the process”

Instrumental in uncovering the original Ergenekon conspiracy Ahmet Altan was involved, then editor of the liberal Turkish newspaper “Taraf”. He revealed the first coup plans against the Erdogan government, which provided therefore, to plunge the country into chaos by stops – so that the military can take control.

Altan is still convinced of the existence of Ergenekon, but he also says that the process had become “out of control”: “. Erdogan abused the process to proceed against opponents” Meanwhile, anyone who criticizes the government will be placed under suspicion of terrorism. Altan consider this development a “tragedy.” Erdogan’s witch hunt discrediting the whole Ergenekon process. “The most important Turkish process the past hundred years has degenerated into a farce,” says Altan.

The bare numbers support this thesis. In no other country in the world so many people are sitting in prison as the alleged terrorists in Turkey. According to research by the AP news agency were in the decade after the terrorist attacks of 11 September 32,000 people worldwide because of suspected terrorist arrested – 12,000 of them in Turkey, almost twice as many as in China. 2006, the Erdogan government tightened then the Turkish Anti-Terror Law. Thereafter, the number of terrorist prisoners jumped from 273 in 2005 to 6345 in 2009.

The Turkish opposition is outraged – and calls for demonstrations. “Erdogan has abolished democracy,” says Ayse Danisoglu, the opposition party CHP deputies in the Turkish parliament. “We live in a police state. The Ergenekon trial is the best proof.”

The authorities have banned any protest near the court.

Ergenekon Trial  is designed to silence the opposition

Many of those charged are innocent,Turkish journalist Nedim Sener claims. “Some are being detained for the same period of time that a sentence would involve,” he complains. The evidence, he says, is opaque and there are many unanswered questions.

The trial will not be remembered for exposing Deep State, but “it will be remembered for destroying the opposition, Sener says

Solicitor Hüseyin Ersöz also thinks the trial is politically motivated. He represents two defendants in the Ergenekon trial – Tuncay Özkan, a journalist, and Mustafa Levent Göktas, a lawyer and former military sergeant.

” Both have been accused of being members of a terrorist organization. They could both get a life sentence for attempting to stage a coup against the government,” Ersöz explained

Ersöz points to the high number of digital documents being used as evidence. “Those are documents without signatures that can’t be attributed to anyone,” he says.

Göktas, for example, was indicted after a CD was found in his office. “Again, a digital document, which actually broke after the police confiscated it. So, Göktas is being tried on the basis of a CD that is now unusable, and he says it’s not even his,” Ersöz says.

Ersöz, who also calls the trial a witch hunt against critics of the state, does not expect anyone to be acquitted. He points to a recent verdict by the constitutional court, which reduced the sentence for so-called terrorists from 10 to five years.

Since many defendants have been detained for five years or longer, in practice, it would be an acquittal for them.

“But I don’t think the court will hand down a fair verdict,” he predicts. Quite the opposite – he expects most defendants to be sentenced to life.

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