Turkey is monitoring the 15, providing a glimpse into Erdogan’s suppression of followers of Fethullah Gulen, a dissident cleric blamed for a 2016 coup d'état
This translation has been automatically generated and has not been verified for accuracy.
In all, 26 people, including family members of the suspects living in both Canada and Turkey, are named in the case files. There are likely others in Canada under surveillance beyond the 26 – Mr. Uras said that Canada had “a big open door” to followers of the Gulen movement, and that “thousands” of people had moved from Turkey to Canada after the failed coup. “They are continuing their political activity here. ... They have their front operations, their NGOs.
“I’m surprised, but not surprised at the same time. I knew the intelligence apparatus of the state was following people, but I’m surprised to be on their list,” said one of those named as a suspect, a Toronto resident who formerly worked at the Intercultural Dialogue Institute, a non-governmental organization that was founded in 2010 by supporters of Mr. Gulen. The file says the man was “one of the prominent executives members of the [Gulen] organization in Canada.
The Turkish government sees Mr. Gulen very differently. The 79-year-old Islamic scholar was a close ally of Mr. Erdogan until Mr. Gulen accused Mr. Erdogan’s government of corruption in 2013. Turkey considers Mr. Gulen to be the architect of the failed 2016 coup d'état, and lists the Gulen movement as a terrorist group, making it illegal to support Mr. Gulen.
Mr. Uras compared his embassy’s monitoring of Gulenists to the way the Canadian embassy in Ankara pays attention to Canadians who travelled to Syria and Iraq to join the Islamic State.In a statement, the Intercultural Dialogue Institute said the court documents showed “the Erdogan government has not stopped at its own borders.” The group thanked the Canadian government for “standing up for human rights, its adherence to the rule of law, and its ability to stand up to Erdogan.
The Ankara court documents were initially obtained by Abdullah Bozkurt, a Turkish journalist who has himself been in exile since the 2016 coup. Mr. Bozkurt shared the files with The Globe. The blacklist also names several Southern Ontario-based real estate agents who are originally from Turkey. The documents contend that their continuing involvement in the buying and selling of homes is a potential indicator of their involvement in financing “terrorist” activity.
“What kind of terrorist groups support education? What terrorist groups open universities?” the realtor said. He argued that Mr. Gulen stands for peace and pluralism and education, whereas “the Erdogan regime closed down everything. He closed more than 20 universities and 1,000 schools and dormitories.”
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