Turkish president's office denounces court decision paving way for his trial
Güncelleme Tarihi:
ISTANBUL - Turkish President Abdullah Gul's office denounced late Monday a court ruling that he should stand trial over a fraud case dating from the 1990s.
President should stand trial: Court
Gul's office said in a statement that a previous ruling had cleared him of any responsibility in the case involving members of the Welfare Party, or RP, convicted of embezzling money from the public Treasury in the 1990s, adding that the president could only be put on trial for treason.
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A court of appeals now will have the final say on the case, as legal experts are divided over whether Gul can stand trial.
"The efforts in some circles to attempt to present our president as a suspect when he is neither charged nor in the process of being tried does not in any way result from good intentions," Gul's office said.
"According to the Constitution it is impossible to put a president on trial for any charge apart from treason," it added.
Government spokesman Cemil Cicek also disputed the ruling.
"It is unthinkable that presidents are not protected by immunity when deputies are," he told reporters following a Cabinet meeting.
Gul, a co-founder of the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP, was elected president in 2007. The fraud case dates back to the late 1990s, when the Welfare Party, or RP, a predecessor to the AKP, was accused of misappropriating funds from the Treasury.
Several executives of the banned Islamic-rooted RP, of which Gul was the deputy chairman at the time, were convicted of falsifying party records and hiding millions of dollars in cash reserves ordered seized after the party was shut down in 1998. As president, Gul enjoys immunity.
Former Prime Minister and the founder of the RP, Necmettin Erbakan, was found guilty five years ago in the same fraud case. Gul, who served as minister under Erbakan with the RP, pardoned Erbakan in 2008 due to his age and ailing health.