Share

Turkey: Air Force Chief Confesses To Coup Attempt; What Of Gulen Conspiracy?

The military top brass did not support the coup.

Advertisement

Erdogan is a strong backer of the insurgents trying to remove president Bashar al-Assad from power in neighbouring Syria.

Washington is working with its North Atlantic Treaty Organisation partner to fight the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, and Kerry credited Turkey for reopening a key air base in the south of the country; Brussels is counting on Turkey to stem refugees from reaching the continent.

Among those arrested was General Bekir Ercan Van, commander of the Incirlik air base from which US aircraft launch air strikes on Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq, an official said.

Ankara has launched an intensive crackdown on the judiciary and the military, with over 6,000 people reportedly arrested over the coup attempt.

European ministers are concerned that president Recep Tayyip Erdogan will exploit the tension to erode democracy through authoritarian measures.

Erdogan has long accused Gulen of running a “parallel state” in Turkey, and urged Obama to extradite the reclusive preacher from the United States to face justice.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, who said he spoke to Erdogan, praised the Turkish people for showing “great courage”, but he also said it was essential for the alliance member to “ensure full respect for democracy and its institutions, the constitutional order, the rule of law and fundamental freedoms”.

Former air force commander Akin Ozturk, alleged to be the ringleader of the uprising, was placed under arrest following questioning by a magistrate along with 25 other suspects, reports said.

The Foreign Ministry has raised the death toll to more than 290, including over 100 rebels, and said 1,400 people were hurt.

“People around us were saying that it was a staged coup orchestrated by President Erdogan”. Turkey had already been hit by repeated suicide bombings over the past year and is struggling to contain an insurgency by Kurdish separatists.

The White House has urged Turkey to “act within the rule of law” and France has told Mr Erdogan that the attempted coup does not give him a “blank cheque” to act.

Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said Sunday that around 6,000 people had been detained in “clean-up operations” and that the number would rise.

Arrests and sackings of those allegedly linked to a failed coup plot in Turkey intensified today as authorities fired 8000 police officers, raising fears of an all-out purge of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s opponents.

Meanwhile, clashes between the participants in the attempted coup and security forces occurred on Sunday, July 17th, at the second largest airport in Istanbul.

Turkish officials said the situation was under control with F-16s patrolling Turkish airspace late Sunday.

The swift move against so many reflected the prior investigation, the government said.

The Turkish lira gained early Monday, paring nearly half the loss triggered by the thwarted coup attempt that broke out in the final hours of last week.

But Pentagon spokesman Peter Cook said Sunday that operations against the Islamic State group had resumed from the base.

Gulen, who remains a powerful figure in Turkey despite living in exile in the United States, claimed the failed coup was engineered so Erdogan could make further “accusations” against his enemies.

Advertisement

The coup attempt appears to have boosted Erdogan’s popularity. “He will presumably use the failed coup as an excuse to eliminate all other sources of dissent and opposition”.

Round-up