ISTANBUL -- Nine journalists, staff members and executives from Turkish opposition daily newspaper Cumhuriyet were arraigned last week on terrorism-related charges, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported Saturday.
Among those arraigned was Murat Sabuncu, the editor-in-chief, who was detained with other staff members Monday and has since been in custody. Cartoonist Musa Kart was also arrested, the newspaper confirmed.
The nine are accused of supporting Kurdish militants as well as a movement led by Fethullah Gulen, the U.S.-based Muslim cleric whom Turkey accuses of masterminding a failed coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in July.
The crackdown on the left-leaning and pro-secular newspaper prompted criticism from opposition groups, with the main opposition Republican People's Party calling an emergency meeting for the evening.
Party Chairman Kemal Kilicdaroglu told reporters that the arrests were "unacceptable" and dismissed government claims that the judiciary was acting independently.
"The judiciary ruled upon orders of the political authority," he said, adding that such practices were seen in dictatorships, not democracies.
Turkish police also detained a dozen Kurdish lawmakers in post-midnight raids Friday.
Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag, co-chairmen of the People's Democratic Party, were sent to court after the top prosecutor in the predominantly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir had sought their formal arrest for aiding terrorism. The party's parliament whip, Idris Baluken, was arrested and jailed in nearby Bingol province.
At Erdogan's request, parliament passed a law in May stripping People's Democratic Party lawmakers of their immunity from prosecution, enabling them to be charged with terrorism-related offenses.
Erdogan says the People's Democratic Party is merely a front for the Kurdistan Workers' Party that has been fighting for autonomy in Turkey's southeast for decades. Demirtas rejects the claim but has said that doesn't mean he has to see the Kurdistan Workers' Party -- classified by Turkey, the U.S. and the EU as a terrorist organization -- in the same way Erdogan does. He has offered to broker peace talks.
"The European Union is gravely concerned about the detention last night of several [People's Democratic Party] members," the bloc said in a statement by EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini and EU Commissioner Johannes Hahn. The arrests "compromise parliamentary democracy in Turkey and exacerbate the already very tense situation in the southeast of the country, for which there can only be a political solution."
The People's Democratic Party is the third-largest party in Turkey's parliament, holding 59 of the legislature's 550 seats. It received more than 6 million votes in an election last June, before the election was repeated five months later. The ruling Justice and Development Party, which Erdogan founded, has 317 seats and is pushing for a referendum on increasing his powers as president next year.
The arrests came on top of Turkey removing the elected mayors of more than two dozen Kurdish municipalities -- including in the city of Diyarbakir, considered the cultural capital of the Kurds -- and replacing them with loyalists.
Erdogan on Saturday appointed a trustee to run Sirnak, a municipality in the southeast, replacing the People's Democratic Party-affiliated co-mayors, the state-run news agency Anadolu reported.
More than 1,000 officials linked to the People's Democratic Party have been arrested since last year, the party says. The party says it is being targeted because it opposes Erdogan's plans to expand his power through constitutional changes.
In June 2015 the People's Democratic Party became the first Kurdish party in Turkey to pass the 10 percent threshold and be elected to parliament. The next month, a cease-fire between the state and the Kurdistan Workers' Party collapsed, and violence ensued.
After the attempted coup in July, Turkey imposed a state of emergency, expanding the government's powers and allowing it to rule by decree.
Turkey has used that power to throttle Internet access, including to social media sites like Twitter and Facebook, while mobile Internet access has also been restricted at times.
Some users have also reported problems accessing virtual private networks, which are used to circumvent bans. Turkey blocks tens of thousands of websites.
Turkey has closed 165 media outlets. More than 100 journalists are in jail. Some of the newspapers and television stations affected are considered by the government to be affiliated with Gulen, but many are Kurdish.
Cumhuriyet -- the paper with a name that translates into "Republic" and which has continued to publish despite the arrests -- ran a headline on its website saying the measures "will go down as a disgrace in history."
The International Press Institute, based in Austria, condemned the arrest of the journalists. An institute board member, Kadri Gursel, is among the Cumhuriyet writers arrested.
Amnesty International called Cumhuriyet "the only remaining mainstream opposition newspaper" and decried "an ongoing systematic attempt to silence all critical voices."
The secular Cumhuriyet has a long history of being critical of both the Kurdistan Workers' Party and of Gulen's followers, raising questions about the allegations that it supported the coup.
The center-left newspaper, founded in 1924, has denied the charges against it. It has been targeted by Erdogan repeatedly during the past year, especially since a previous editor-in-chief, Can Dundar, published a report alleging that the government was shipping weapons to Syrian rebels.
Dundar moved to Germany after being sentenced with another writer to five years in jail for their reporting.
Information for this article was contributed by Shabtai Gold of the German Press Agency; by Benjamin Harvey, Firat Kozok and Onur Ant of Bloomberg News; and by staff members of The Associated Press.
A Section on 11/06/2016