Turkish interior minister says more than 3,000 police officers resigned in a decade

Duvar English

Some 3,109 police officers have resigned from their posts in the last 10 years in Turkey, Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu has said in response to a question by main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) deputy Ali Mahir Başarır in parliament.

Başarır said the number of police officers that committed suicide had increased recently and brought the issue to the agenda of parliament and tabled the question to Soylu.

Upon Soylu’s answer, Başarır said these figures show that the police officers were working under very difficult conditions.

“It means that a police officer resigns almost every day. The fact that the government does not keep promises it made to police officers, teachers and health workers also plays an important role in these resignations,” Başarır stated.

Soylu left the question “How many police officers committed suicide and were subjected to workplace bullying in the last 10 years?” unanswered.

“Our research proposal to investigate the increasing number of police suicides was unfortunately rejected by the votes of [ruling coalition Justice and Development Party] AKP and [Nationalist Movement Party] MHP deputies. It is incomprehensible that such a case was prevented from being investigated or the information on how many police officers committed suicide was hidden,” Başarır added.

Başarır also criticized Soylu’s lack of response to the question about the number of police officers that committed suicide and cases of workplace bullying.  

“One of the rare monitoring mechanisms we have is [parliamentary] questions. As MPs, we ask these questions on behalf of the nation. However, while many of our written questions are left unanswered, the relevant ministers give irrelevant answers to many of them,” he said.