TURKEY COUP: Release for 38.000 prisoners j.....
Turkey coup: Release for 38,000 prisoners jailed before coup
- 45 minutes ago
- Europe
AFP
Turkey is to release conditionally 38,000 prisoners jailed before last month's failed coup, while its jails are crowded with new detainees.
Some 23,000 people have been detained or arrested since the July coup, although the government has not said its move is to free up space for them.
The justice minister said those who had served half their sentence, rather than two-thirds, would be eligible.
Crimes such as murder and sex abuse would be excluded, he said.
It is clear that the post-coup clampdown has stretched the prison service to breaking point and extra capacity is urgently needed, the BBC's Mark Lowen reports from Istanbul.
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Turkey's prison population has trebled since 2002, when President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's AK Party came to power, our correspondent notes.
Some 187,000 people were being held in Turkey's 364 prisons this year, according to figures published in March by Turkey's justice ministry (in Turkish). That figure was already 4,000 higher than the capacity and the recent detentions have placed the system under extra strain.
Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag emphasised the conditional release did not apply to anyone convicted of crimes committed since 1 July, which automatically disqualifies anyone arrested in the aftermath of the failed coup a fortnight later.
It was not an amnesty, he added.
Since the coup was put down, Turks have witnessed a purge of people in the military and public services suspected of supporting US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who is accused of orchestrating the plot.
As well as thousands of detentions, 82,000 people have been dismissed or suspended from their jobs. Further dismissals were reported on Wednesday, affecting 2,360 police and dozens of civil servants and staff from the military and coast guard.
Some 240 people died resisting the coup on 15 and 16 July, as rebel parts of the military tried to seize control of Turkey, sending tanks into Ankara and Istanbul.
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