The 1980 military intervention severely restricted trade union activities. Following the 1980 coup, the military government prohibited collective bargaining until May 1984. After 12 September 1980, the National Security Council suspended the activities of DİSK and its affiliated unions. Their assets were confiscated and put under trustee administration. 52 DİSK leaders were arrested and put on trial with the demand of death penalty on the grounds that they had „attempted to demolish the constitutional regime". By the time the military court delivered its verdict in 1986, the DISK trial had 1,477 defendants. The DISK trial was one of many mass trials that progressed ponderously through the military courts, presided over by high-ranking officers of the Turkish armed forces.