Turkey must produce clear evidence in pursuing participants in a failed coup and avoid targeting teachers and journalists simply because they worked for firms run by the Muslim cleric Ankara portrays as its mastermind, the head of the European rights watchdog said as quoted by the Voice of America.

Otherwise, said Thorbjorn Jagland, Turkey may be challenged in the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, which is tasked with enforcing the European Convention on Human Rights.

Turkey said the judicial process would be fully transparent.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has cracked down on schools, media and businesses run by U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen since the July coup. Several thousand soldiers have been expelled from the army, and more than 100,000 people, including civil servants, teachers, journalists and soldiers, have been suspended or sacked.

"We are stressing to the Turks that they have to present clear evidence, be able to separate those who were clearly behind the coup and those who have been in some way or another connected to or working for this so-called Gulen network," Jagland, secretary general of the Council of Europe, said.

"They are not necessarily guilty. For teachers and journalists that worked in schools or media outlets of Gulen, you cannot say automatically that because they've done that, they are part of this military coup."

Gulen has denied being behind the coup.

Source: MENA