Turkey's Dogan Holding says two detained in police raids in Gulen-linked probe (updated)

Hurriyet Gazetecilik ve Matbaacilik

05/01/2017 07:19

(Adds shares, background) 
    ISTANBUL, Jan 5 (Reuters) - Turkish police detained the 
chief legal advisor and a former chief executive of Dogan 
Holding, one of the country's biggest conglomerates, on Thursday 
in a probe into the network of a U.S.-based cleric blamed for a 
failed coup, sending its shares tumbling. 
    Dogan - which has interests in media, finance, energy and 
tourism and owns newspaper Hurriyet and broadcaster CNN Turk - 
said the raids were only on the personal offices and homes of 
the two individuals and that its operations were unaffected. 
    Its shares  DOHOL.IS  fell as much as 9.9 percent after the 
market opened, although they later recovered somewhat to trade 
down 3.7 percent at 0.78 Turkish lira ($0.22) by 0706 GMT. 
Hurriyet  HURGZ.IS  fell as much as 7.6 percent. 
    Last month, another Dogan Holding executive, Barbaros 
Muratoglu, was remanded in custody on an accusation of "aiding a 
terror group" as part of an investigation into the exiled Muslim 
cleric Fethullah Gulen and his followers. Ankara refers to the 
group as the "Gulenist Terror Organisation".  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL5N1EB112 
    In its statement to the Istanbul stock exchange, Dogan said 
Thursday's detentions were part of the same investigation. 
    "The search has been carried out solely in the personal 
offices of the mentioned executives and there is no situation 
that has an impact on the operations of our company or its 
subsidiaries," the statement said. 
    Since the failed coup in July, in which more than 240 people 
were killed, the authorities have detained, dismissed or 
suspended some 120,000 people including soldiers, police 
officers, teachers, judges and journalists, although thousands 
have since been restored to their posts. 
    More than 41,000 people have been jailed pending trial out 
of 100,000 who have faced investigation.  
    Hundreds of companies, many of them smaller provincial 
firms, have also been seized. 
    Dogan Holding itself has not been formally accused of any 
wrongdoing and has disavowed links to Gulen. 
    ($1 = 3.5590 liras) 
 
 (Reporting by Ceyda Caglayan and Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Nick 
Tattersall) 
 ((humeyra.pamuk@thomsonreuters.com; +90 212 3507062; Reuters 
Messaging: humeyra.pamuk.reuters.com@reuters.net)) 
 
Keywords: TURKEY SECURITY/DOGAN HOLDING