211 airline staffers sacked as Turkey continues mass purge

Turkey’s national airline staffers have become the latest to be affected by a widening crackdown over a botched coup attempt, as the government continues with its mass purge of those suspected of having links to putsch plotters.   

The state-run Turkish Airlines announced Monday that it fired 211 employees over suspected links to Fethullah Gulen, US-based opposition cleric whom the government has blamed for the July 15 coup attempt in the country.

Turkey’s flag carrier said, in a statement, that the contracts of the employees were terminated due to operational necessity, inefficiency, poor performance as well as providing support to the movement of Gulen.

The workers included management and cabin crew.

Initial reports had denied that the dismissals, which occurred late Sunday, had anything to do with Gulen, saying the workers were sacked over inefficiency issues.  

Some local news outlets said the number of those dismissed was well above 350, noting that 250 cabin crew and 100 management and administrative staff were sacked by the Turkish Airlines. They said a deputy chief executive responsible for the airline's financial affairs was among those being fired.

Reports say more than 60,000 people have been sacked, suspended or detained as part of the government’s massive crackdown on those branded as coup plotters or sympathizers.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has accused Gulen of orchestrating the botched coup, which claimed the lives of nearly 300 people in a matter of 24 hours. Gulen has denied the allegation.

Three soldiers detained over attack on Erdogan hotel

In a separate development on Monday, Turkish authorities said that three soldiers were detained in southwestern Turkey over an attack on the hotel where Erdogan was staying in the night of the coup attempt.

A security source told the state-run Anadolou agency that Taner Berber, Ilyas Yasar and Gokhan Guclu were involved in the attack on Erdogan's hotel in Marmaris on the Mediterranean coast.

The source said security forces were hunting other soldiers who attacked the hotel, adding that the attackers “narrowly missed” the president who left the town for Istanbul at the time.

The three were detained during a traffic check in the Cetibeli district of Marmaris and have been taken to a police station for questioning, AFP reported.

The attack on Erdogan's hotel, where he was vacationing with family members including his son-in-law, Energy Minister Berat Albayrak, came shortly after he left the resort by plane for Istanbul.

Erdogan said if he had waited 15 minutes more, he would have been killed or taken hostage. 

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