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Thursday March 28, 2024

German prosecutors drop Turkish clerics spying probe

By AFP
December 07, 2017

BERLIN: German prosecutors on Wednesday said they were dropping a case against several Muslim clerics suspected of spying for Turkey due to insufficient evidence and as some were out of reach of law enforcers. The probe had inflamed tensions with Ankara, at a time when ties were frayed over Berlin’s criticisms of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s human rights record. The Muslim clerics targeted by the German investigation belonged to Ditib, an organisation controlled by Ankara that manages some 900 mosques and religious centres in Germany.