Eight soldiers arrested for alleged plot against deputy PM

AFP - Eight Turkish soldiers have been questioned over a presumed plot against the country's vice prime minister, the army said on its website Saturday.

The eight are being detained in military barracks in Ankara housing elite army units after being grilled by a civilian prosecutor on Friday evening, it said.

Two soldiers were arrested near the Ankara home of Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc on Saturday night but were soon released. Some media reports have said they were linked to an alleged plot to kill Arinc.

The military has denied being part of any plot and said the two soldiers who were detained were investigating a mole in the army who was passing on classified information to civilians.

The two men were released early Sunday after police searched their homes, seizing computers and electronic data storage devices.

The soldiers were detained only days after Turkey's chief of staff issued a fresh warning over a "psychological campaign" to smear the army and voiced concern over a possible "confrontation between institutions".

Dozens of suspects, among them retired generals, are on trial accused of being members of an alleged secularist network which plotted assassinations and political chaos to provoke a military coup against the ruling Islamist-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Prosecutors have also targeted prominent journalists and intellectuals known as AKP critics, triggering accusations that the probe has degenerated into a government-sponsored campaign to bully opponents.

The army, which sees itself as the guardian of Turkey's secular system, has unseated four governments since 1960.