Trial opens in Turkey against 221 suspected coup instigators

The trial has opened in Turkey’s capital against the alleged instigators of last summer’s failed military coup.A total of 221 people, including 27 ex-generals, went on trial on Ankara’s outskirts Monday at a courthouse built especially to try suspects of the failed July 15 uprising. They face life imprisonment.The suspects were forced to march along a lane to the courthouse, as pro-government protesters called for the death penalty to be reinstated.The main defendants are Gen. Akin Ozturk, a former air force commander, and other alleged members of the so-called Peace at Home Council ”” a group on whose behalf a coup declaration was read on state television.Turkey says the coup was orchestrated by followers of U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen.AP