September 21, 2012

A Turkish court convicted 330 military officers, including three former top generals, and sentenced them to prison terms as long as 20 years on Friday in a trial of suspects from the armed forces accused of a wide-ranging plot to overthrow the government nearly a decade ago. Thirty-four were acquitted.

The convictions and sentences, reported by the Turkish news media, signaled completion of the first trial in a civilian court of defendants in a coup plot known as Sledgehammer, named for a 2003 military exercise. The prosecution of the case was widely regarded as a test of the democratically elected government’s power over the formerly dominant military in Turkey, which has been responsible for four coups since 1960.

Prosecutors have said the Sledgehammer coup plotters had conspired in a master plan to bomb mosques and assassinate community leaders in an effort to stir unrest and overthrow the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose Justice and Development Party has roots in an Islamist movement. The military has historically regarded itself as the guardian of the secular political system in Turkey, which has a Muslim majority.

Defense lawyers in the Sledgehammer case had denounced much of the evidence as flimsy, and all of the verdicts are expected to be appealed. The trial, which began in December 2010, polarized public opinion in Turkey.

Hundreds of other suspects, including military members, politicians and journalists face prosecution in a separate case alleging that they conspired to topple the government.

 http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/22/world/europe/turkish-court-convic...