An administrator of the Turkish military university, established by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to help "clean up the member of the Gülen network from the army" after a 2016 failed military coup attempt, has been arrested over alleged links to the Gülen network.
The network was one of the masterminds of the July 2016 coup attempt.
Authorities formally arrested Colonel Kadir Atakan of the National Defense University after detaining him some two weeks ago, local media reported. He was a director in charge of organizational matters at the school, which is not yet fully operational, reports said.
Erdoğan had ordered the establishment of the university after the July 2016 coup attempt, when a group of Gülen network-connected soldiers, commandeered tanks and warplanes in an attempt to topple down him.
The Gülen network led by the U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen, who had strong ties with Erdoğan and his AKP party. Due to sharp power struggles within the state apparatus, the AKP and its ally Gülen network have fallen into dispute. After the failed coup attempt, the government officially started to deem the network as a terrorist organization and named it "Fethullahist Terrorist Organization [FETÖ]".
Most of the AKP members, who were strongly tied to Gülen network, are appointed to the critical missions of the public institutions and even ministries.
