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Egypt blocks UN text backing Turkish government: diplomats

A council statement Saturday that condemned the coup attempt and called on all parties in Turkey to respect the country’s “democratically elected government” failed to be adopted after Egypt’s objection to the terminology.

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“We proposed different language that respects democratic and constitutional principles but the Americans refused to engage”, Egypt’s UN Ambassador Amr Aboulatta told Reuters.

Turkey and several Security Council members including the United States anxious the statement would have been too weak without wording explicitly supporting the Turkish government.

The source said the allegations have yet to be substantiated, “but Turkey will not sit back if it turns out the UAE or Egypt were involved in plotting the coup in any way, shape, or form”.

Diplomats said Egypt asked for a call for all parties to “respect the democratically elected government of Turkey” to be removed from the draft statement, saying the council is “in no position to qualify, or label that government – or any other government for that matter – as democratically elected or not”.

In his statement, he “strongly condemn the attempt from groups in the armed forces to overthrow the government of Turkey and express my honest condolences for the lives lost during the coup attempt”.

Egypt’s official news paper Al-ahlam reported on its website that the spokesperson of Egyptian foreign ministry said, “Egypt have reservations about the way part of the statement was phased, but not to object the content”.

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“Since Friday, Turkey has reviewed every possible piece of evidence supposedly linking the UAE and Egypt to the attempted coup”, he said. Erdogan supports the Muslim Brotherhood of former Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi, who was deposed by the Egyptian army in 2013.

Turkish military forces on July 16 opened fire on crowds gathered in Istanbul following a coup attempt causing casualties an AFP