Turkey targeted journalists, academics and airline workers Monday in its ongoing crackdown on people allegedly linked to the exiled Muslim cleric it says directed the failed military coup against the Ankara government.
Turkish authorities issued warrants for the detention of 42 journalists, took 31 academics into custody and fired 211 workers at Turkish Airlines.
Turkey also detained three fugitive soldiers on suspicion of taking part in an attack on a hotel in the Aegean Sea resort of Marmaris where President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was vacationing when the putsch unfolded on July 15. Erdogan has said that if he waited 15 minutes more before fleeing the hotel he would have been killed or taken hostage. Four other soldiers are still on the run.
State-run news agency Anadolu said prominent writer Nazli Ilicak is among the journalists wanted for questioning. He has been critical of Erdogan and opposed his government clampdown on followers of Fethullah Gulen, the 75-year-old cleric who has been living in the eastern U.S. state of Pennsylvania since 1999.
Ankara has blamed Gulen for the uprising that left about 290 people dead and demanded his extradition. Washington says it is considering documents Turkey sent about Gulen's alleged involvement in the failed coup, but has made no commitment to return him.