On the eve of a major constitutional referendum, Turkish prosecutors have launched an investigation into 17 US politicians, bureaucrats and academics in connection with the attempted coup that rocked President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government last year.

Included in the investigation are former CIA Director John Brennan, former CIA Deputy Director David Cohen, and Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer. The officials are accused of collaborating with Turkish resistance groups to overthrow President Erdogan, a Turkish state-run news service reported on Saturday.

Also named in the inquiry are Preet Bharara, former US attorney for the Southern District of New York and Henri Barkey, director of the Middle East Program at the Wilson Center.

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The Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office in Istanbul plans to investigate the individuals’ entry to Turkey, their meetings while there, and any ties to Turkish expatriate Fethullah Gulen and the Gulenist movement he founded.

Turkey experienced its bloodiest coup attempt in recorded history on 15 July, 2016, when a subset of the Turkish military drove tanks into the streets and dropped bombs on Istanbul and Ankara. The coup was eventually quelled by President Erdoğan's loyalists, but 241 people were killed and 2,194 injured.

The Turkish government blames the attempted coup on Fethullah Gulen, a former supporter of Mr Erdogan who has lived in exile in the United States since 1990. Mr Gulen is a moderate Muslim cleric who engaged in a battle for power with the more conservative Mr Erdogan in 2013. The 17 officials on the list are now suspected of working with Mr Gulen to orchestrate the coup from abroad.

In a telephone interview with The Independent, Mr Barkey denied anyone on the list had contacted Mr Gulen in years. Turkish officials, he claimed, launched the investigation to stir up anti-Western sentiment ahead of the county’s constitutional referendum on Sunday.

“To have a big indictment of the former head of the CIA, the former US prosecutor from New York, this is one more little reminder to the public that these nasty foreigners are the ones who organised the coup attempt,” Mr Barkey said.

Sunday’s referendum could shift the Turkish system of government from parliamentary to presidential, expanding Mr Erdoğan’s power over national security, the judicial system, and more. Critics claim the change would strengthen Mr Erdogan’s increasingly autocratic grip on the country.

Mr Erdogan has fallen out of favour with the west in recent years for jailing journalists and labelling opposition parties as terrorist organisations. Now, voters who seek to curtail the president's powers say they have received death threats ahead of Sunday's referendum.

Surveys from polling company Konda showed a 51 per cent chance of a “yes” vote on Saturday.</s>The Chief Public Prosecutor's Office in Istanbul began the proceedings on Saturday, after some Turkish attorneys filed a criminal complaint against 17 individuals including US politicians, bureaucrats and academics.The people are suspected of having links to what Turkey entitles FETO, an alleged terrorist network run by Fethullah Gulen, a cleric based in the United States whom Ankara blames for the coup attempt of July 15.The prosecutors said the US individuals had been accused of attempting to overthrow the Turkish government and constitution. They said the suspects held meetings in Istanbul on July 15 and July 17 that year and their mere entries to Turkey was also subject to investigation.More than 250 people were killed in the process of the failed coup in Turkey. The government then swiftly launched a crackdown to arrest those behind the attempt. The massive action, which has seen more than 40,000 arrested and over 100,000 discharged from their jobs, has faced increasing international criticism, especially from Europe, where governments believe Ankara has acted beyond the rule of law. The crackdown, along with a series of other disputes, has badly affected ties between Turkey and Europe.Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday that Ankara had been unduly left outside the European Union in its bid to join the continental bloc. "Turkey is not their scapegoat. Everyone will know their place," he told a local broadcaster.In late March, the Turkish president said Ankara would continue to preserve its economic ties with Europe but other aspects of relations would certainly be revised after Turkey's constitutional referendum on April 16.Erdogan had said Turkey was angered by the way Europeans banned Turkish officials over the past months from promoting the referendum in European cities, adding that Turkey would certainly reciprocate.He said in March that a mega deal between Turkey and Europe on the reprocessing of refugees would be reviewed after the referendum.Under the agreement, the European Union had promised a series of benefits to Turkey in return for accepting refugees who landed on European shores in Greece. Turkey has yet to enjoy many of those benefits, including a visa-free travel for its citizens to Europe and accelerated talks for joining the EU.
The Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office in Istanbul launches an investigation into 17 United States citizens in connection with the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt.