Coup arrests push Turkish penal system to breaking point
Source: Reuters
Even before last month's coup attempt, Turkey's penal system was overstretched, with crowded prisons and backlogged courts. Now, it is struggling to cope with an influx of thousands who have been detained in the aftermath of the attempted putsch.
The government says the situation is under control, but pictures of some alleged coup plotters handcuffed, stripped to their underpants and detained in sweltering rooms have raised concern among rights groups. There are reports that some jails are so crowded that prisoners have to sleep in shifts.
There are now so many alleged putschists that the government says it doesn't have a courthouse big enough to try them all and will need to build new ones. Some 3,000 prosecutors and judges are among those who have been detained, making it even more difficult to find members of the judiciary to handle trials.
Turkey's prison population has trebled since 2002 when the ruling AK Party founded by President Tayyip Erdogan came to power. Some are jailed in connection with the conflict in the mainly Kurdish southeast, which in the last year has seen some of the worst violence since the insurgency began in 1984.
Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-turkey-security-prison-idUSKCN10F1RV