Baykal: "We built the republic of Turkey, not the deep state"

Speaking at his main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) parliamentary group meeting yesterday, Deniz Baykal spoke about the controversy surrounding the ongoing Ergenekon probe into a right-wing gang. Charging that the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) is trying to build its own "deep state", he said Turkey's security forces and judges are the target of this project. Rebuffing Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's attempting to link the CHP with a possible "deep state," Baykal said that his party � Turkey's first political party � had built the Republic of Turkey, not the deep state. Baykal also criticized the detention of Ilhan Selcuk, the chief columnist for Cumhuriyet daily, as part of the Ergenekon probe. "Such things happened in Turkey during the (1980) coup," he said.