(NSI News Source Info) ANKARA, Turkey - June 17, 2009: A preliminary probe into an alleged army plot to discredit Turkey's Islamist-rooted government suggests that the document outlining the plan was a forgery, military prosecutors said June 15. 
Turkey's chief of staff, General Ilker Basbug, arrives for a meeting with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara on June 16, 2009. Erdogan met with Basbug as tensions rose in Ankara over an alleged military plot to discredit his Islamist-rooted government. Erdogan said his Justice and Development Party (AKP) would lodge a legal complaint over the purported plan, allegedly drawn up at the army headquarters and listing a series of actions to discredit the AKP and an influential religious community close to the government.
"Drawing on the clues obtained so far ... we have reached the conclusion that the document was not drawn up in any of the general staff's departments," said the statement, carried by Anatolia news agency.
The prosecutors said they were seeking to obtain the original copy of the document for a forensic examination to reach "a definite conclusion on whether it is forged or real."
The Taraf daily, which often targets the army, reported last week it had obtained a copy of a colonel's plan "to break popular support" for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its influential supporter, the Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen.
Gulen is the leader of the Gulen religious movement.
The alleged plan envisioned a series of actions, mostly media propaganda, to discredit the AKP and create divisions among party ranks.
Taraf quoted a section calling for raids on student houses run by the Gulen community in which "the discovery of weapons and munition[s] will be ensured" to secure the brotherhood's classification as "an armed terrorist organization."
The Turkish military, which has significant political clout, has often chided the AKP for undermining Turkey's secular principles.
Hardline Turkish secularists accuse the party of having a secret agenda to destroy the secular system and replace it with an Islamist regime, a charge the AKP fiercely rejects.
Several retired generals were among dozens of suspects arrested as part of a controversial probe, under way since June 2007, into an alleged plot to spark political chaos in Turkey and prompt a military coup against the AKP.
Turkey's chief of staff, General Ilker Basbug, arrives for a meeting with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara on June 16, 2009. Erdogan met with Basbug as tensions rose in Ankara over an alleged military plot to discredit his Islamist-rooted government. Erdogan said his Justice and Development Party (AKP) would lodge a legal complaint over the purported plan, allegedly drawn up at the army headquarters and listing a series of actions to discredit the AKP and an influential religious community close to the government.
"Drawing on the clues obtained so far ... we have reached the conclusion that the document was not drawn up in any of the general staff's departments," said the statement, carried by Anatolia news agency.
The prosecutors said they were seeking to obtain the original copy of the document for a forensic examination to reach "a definite conclusion on whether it is forged or real."
The Taraf daily, which often targets the army, reported last week it had obtained a copy of a colonel's plan "to break popular support" for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its influential supporter, the Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen.
Gulen is the leader of the Gulen religious movement.
The alleged plan envisioned a series of actions, mostly media propaganda, to discredit the AKP and create divisions among party ranks.
Taraf quoted a section calling for raids on student houses run by the Gulen community in which "the discovery of weapons and munition[s] will be ensured" to secure the brotherhood's classification as "an armed terrorist organization."
The Turkish military, which has significant political clout, has often chided the AKP for undermining Turkey's secular principles.
Hardline Turkish secularists accuse the party of having a secret agenda to destroy the secular system and replace it with an Islamist regime, a charge the AKP fiercely rejects.
Several retired generals were among dozens of suspects arrested as part of a controversial probe, under way since June 2007, into an alleged plot to spark political chaos in Turkey and prompt a military coup against the AKP.
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