500-MAN TRIAL

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29336, 15 October 1960, Page 13

500-MAN TRIAL

Former Turk Leaders (Rec. 11 p.m.) YASSIADA ISLAND (Turkey). Oct. 14. Adnan Menderes, the former Prime Minister of Turkey, faces 10 charges which carry a total punishment of three death sentences, 123 years’ imprisonment, and six years’ exile, in a mass treason trial, which will open today. About 500 leaders of the former regime—ousted in a bloodless coup on May 27—face massive indictments accusing them of abusing Turkey’s Constitution, misappropriating State funds, and political corruption. The prosecution is demanding the death sentence against 38 persons. including Mr Menderes, the former President. Celal Bayar, and 16 former Cabinet members.

Bayar, who also faces a multiple indictment, is likely to be without the services of a lawyer, according to press reports last night. It was reported that he had engaged the services of a prominent lawyer, but later the lawyer was said not to have agreed on terms. The Turkish press hails the trial as “the greatest since Nuremberg.’’ Popular interest has been built up not so much by the political drama as by several additional charges against the top leaders involving their private lives. / Among the charges listed against Menderes is one of “procuring the abortion of a child conceived in extra-marital relations.”