PRIME Minister Tayyip Erdogan pressed a widening purge of the police command yesterday, tackling what he describes as a foreign-backed conspiracy to undermine him and create a "state within a state".
The gathering crisis raised fears of damage to the Turkish economy and a fracturing in Mr Erdogan's AK Party, helping drive the lira to a historic low.
Yesterday saw 14 more senior officers removed over a series of anti-corruption raids and the detention of senior businessmen close to Mr Erdogan as well as sons of three cabinet ministers.
The powerful Istanbul chief was sacked on Thursday following the dismissal of dozens of unit chiefs.
"This is not one of those crises from which Erdogan can come out stronger," said Henri Barkey, a Turkey specialist at Lehigh University's department of international relations. "The public will ask if this is the result of an evil probe (or) foreign plot, then why are all of these police chiefs sacked?
"People will not forget the talk of money (found) at people's houses, and there will be a reflection of it at the ballot box."
Mr Erdogan has refrained from naming US-based Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen, a man with strong influence in the police and judiciary, as the hand behind the raids which have shaken the political elite. But Gulen's Hizmet movement has been at odds with Mr Erdogan in recent months.
Mr Erdogan, who called the raids and detentions a "dirty operation" to tarnish the government, is under pressure to resolve the crisis before it hits the economy.
"The problem is this is not happening at a time when the economy is given enough of a buffer to withstand political turbulence. The fear is that the authorities start to loosen fiscal policy," said Manik Narain, strategist at UBS in London.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article