An indictment on six former employees of ASELSAN, Turkey's leading defense contractor, claims staff linked to the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) accessed tightly guarded, critical projects and leaked information to senior figures of the group. Those senior figures in turn shared the data with intelligence services of other countries, the indictment, partially published in the Yeni Şafak newspaper.

According to the indictment, FETÖ members at ASELSAN targeted strategic defense projects shrouded in secrecy in a bid to save Turkey from dependence on other countries for defense equipment such as weapons and warplanes etc. "Global powers and their intelligence services employed FETÖ to target the defense industry," an excerpt from the indictment reads. It claims evidence shows that FETÖ-linked ASELSAN employees violated secrecy rules and sent confidential documents regarding projects via email and informed their superiors in FETÖ about the projects the contractor was working on.

FETÖ, which Ankara blames for last year's foiled coup attempt, is run by U.S-based Fetullah Gülen. The group is accused in a series of cases of wielding influence in the military, law enforcement, judiciary and bureaucracy through its members.

The group's members faced similar accusations of stalling defense projects in the past, as well. Industry and Technology Minister Faruk Özlü recently said that a high-tech border security project developed by Turkish scientists might have been deliberately delayed by FETÖ infiltrators, although he avoided openly naming the group as the one to blame for problems in the project. Professor Ahmet Arif Ergin, head of the state-run Scientific and Technological Research Council (TÜBİTAK), earlier claimed that Gülenists indirectly helped the PKK terrorist organization by blocking a critical security project. The minister said TÜBİTAK and ASELSAN were working on an important border security project that would provide more security than simple barriers and walls and would integrate a warning system improved with electronic devices and night vision equipment, and they detected "attempts to stall it and slow down the development process."