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Nearly 6 thousand policemen participated in Ergenekon operation in Turkey on July 1

02 July 2008 09:48 (UTC +04:00)

Ankaraâ€“APA. 21 people were arrested during the operation carried out by the Turkish police on July 1. Nearly 6Â 000 police in 40 separate groups carried out the operations in Ankara, Istanbul, Antalya and Trabzon. The operations were planned last Saturday by the investigators of the case of Ergenekon conspiratorial organization Zekariyya Oz, Mehmet Ali Pekguzel, Nihat Tashkin and some high-ranking police officers. A directive for the operations and arrests was prepared at the meeting in the prosecutorâ€™s office in Istanbulâ€™s Beshiktash District. On the next day following the meeting, Istanbul Court of Crave Punishment issued an order for the searches in the houses and offices of the arrested people. According to this decision, 40 groups of 120-150 started operations in early morning on July 1. As a result of operations 21 people, including two army generals -for the first time in the history of Turkish Republic - former head of the gendarmerie forces retired Gen. Åžener Eruygur and retired Gen. Hurshit Tolon, as well as former intelligence chief of the gendarmerie forces gen. Levent Ersoz, Admiral Ilker Guven, Colonel Atilla Ugur, Chairman of Ankara Chamber of Commerce Sinan AygÑŒn, Editor-in-Chief of Tercuman newspaper Ufug Buyukchelebi and Ankara representative of the Cumhuriyet daily Mustafa Balbay were taken in custody. Three people, including former member of the Parliament Turhan Chomez are wanted.