Turkish police target media offices in raid

ISTANBUL — Turkish police arrested at least 24 people with close ties to a movement led by a U.S.-based moderate Islamic cleric in raids across the country Sunday, the country's state-run news agency reported.

The offices of Today's Zaman newspaper and STV television news were raided in an apparent crackdown on detractors of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Journalists, television producers and police were among those detained, the Anadolu Agency reported.

The government accuses cleric Fethullah Gulen's movement of orchestrating an alleged plot to try and bring it down. The Turkish government says the group's followers were behind corruption allegations that last year forced four Cabinet ministers to resign. Gulen, a former government ally who lives in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania, denies the accusations.

A court issued a warrant to arrest 32 people connected to the movement and 24 of them were detained in raids in Istanbul and other cities across Turkey on Sunday, the Anadolu Agency reported.

Protesters denouncing the government's actions quickly gathered outside the offices of Today's Zaman — a leading newspaper that is often critical of Erdogan — to denounce the arrests chanting "free speech cannot be silenced!" Ekrem Dumanli, the newspaper's editor, was shown being arrested on live TV at the offices.

Later Sunday, nearly 1,000 protesters converged on the Istanbul courthouse where Dumanli was brought. Chanting and waving flags, the protesters were careful not to raise their voices, concerned about inciting the heavily armed police presence on hand to respond.

Speaking in hushed tones, Ahmet Cakir, a 36-year-old accountant, said he at the courthouse because the attacks on Turkey's "free media are getting so much worse."

"The government is trying to silence the opposition media," Cakir said. "The opposition media can't be controlled by (Erdogan's administration) so they want them gone."

Media watchdog group Reporters Without Borders ranks Turkey 154th out of 180 countries evaluated for their press freedom.

The U.S. State Department raised concerns about the arrests, noting free media, due process and judicial independence are key elements in Turkey's constitution.

"We urge the Turkish authorities to ensure their actions do not violate these core values and Turkey's own democratic foundations," State Department Spokesperson Jen Psaki said in a statement.

Turkish analysts say media criticism of Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party, or AKP, prompted the authoritarian leader to attempt to suppress the voices of his opponents in the political arena as well as the news media.

"Over the past year, Erdogan's AKP has responded to political opposition by tearing up the rule book, silencing critical voices, and wielding a stick," said Emma Sinclair-Webb, a researcher for Human Rights Watch, in a recently published 38-page report on rights abuses in Turkey.

The report details how during the course of 2014, the Erdogan administration made changes that "increases government surveillance powers and unfettered access to data, protects intelligence personnel from investigation, and increases penalties for whistle blowers and journalists who publish leaked intelligence."

On Friday, Erdogan signaled a crackdown against supporters of Gulen. "We have gone into their lairs and we will go into them again. Whoever is beside them and behind them, we will bring down this network and bring it to account," Erdogan said while speaking at a business forum in Ankara, according to Reuters.

Word of the planned arrests of up to 147 journalists throughout the country first leaked online Thursday evening by a Twitter user with the handle Fuat Avni, a pseudonym. The informant originally tweeted the arrests would take place Friday.

Previous police-backed operations and other stories have been leaked through the Twitter account, prompting headlines in Turkish newspapers proclaiming "Fuat Avni gets it right again." The person or people using the account claim to be members of Erdogan's inner circle.

Contributing: Jane Onyanga-Omara, USA TODAY; The Associated Press