Turkey’s prime minister: Of generals, judges and presidents

In celebration of liberty THAT long-awaited “we told you so” moment arrived on June 18th for Dani Rodrik, an economist at Princeton University, and his wife Pinar Dogan. An Istanbul court ordered the release of 230 people, mostly army officers convicted of trying to overthrow the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and his Justice and Development (AK) government. Among them was Cetin Dogan, a retired general and Mr Rodrik’s father-in-law, sentenced in the “Sledgehammer” case.Mr Rodrik and his wife have campaigned hard to prove that much of the case, in which the generals supposedly planned to bomb mosques during Friday prayers and shoot down Greek fighters to justify a coup, rested on bogus digital evidence. Forensic experts concurred, in 25 separate reports. The constitutional court duly called for a retrial because the prosecution’s case was flawed and key defence witnesses were not allowed to testify, and the Istanbul court released the suspects.Coincidentally on the same day, an Ankara court sentenced Kenan Evren, a 96-year-old general and former president who led a violent coup in 1980, to life imprisonment. The same verdict was...

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