Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday chaired a crunch security meeting for the first time since the failed coup, after a widening purge that has seen around 50,000 people either detained or sacked.
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Erdogan issued a statement outlining the state of emergency after an extraordinary session of the country’s National Security Council in Ankara, which lasted for four hours and 40 minutes, and a two-hour cabinet meeting.
Erdogan said the aim was “to be able to take the necessary steps in the most effective and quickest manner to remove the threat directed against our country’s democracy, its state of law and our citizens’ rights and freedoms”.
The agency said the schools are linked to Gulen, a former ally of Erdogan who lives in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania and has denied accusations that he engineered the coup attempt that was quashed by security forces and protesters loyal to the government.
Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency reported the infantry captain and a lieutenant are suspected followers of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who has been blamed for the failed uprising by some military units.
“Those individuals in this group, understood to be members of the Gulenist terrorist organisation, attacked its state and its nation using planes, helicopters, tanks and all kinds of weaponry”.
The United States has so far shown little interest in Turkey’s repeated demands for Mr Gulen’s extradition dating back to 2013 when a corruption scandal shook Mr Erdogan’s government. Turkish authorities have also charged 99 admirals and generals thought to have been involved in Friday night’s attempted coup.
Erdogan called it an attempted judicial coup by a “parallel establishment” within the state.
It comes as Mr Erdogan also stated he would support the reintroduction of capital punishment for the plotters of the failed coup.
He underlined that the move aimed at combatting the growing terror threat in the country was fully in line with the constitution and did not violate the rule of law or basic freedoms of Turkish citizens.
Meanwhile, more than 20,000 teachers and administrators have also been suspended from the Education Ministry and several academics have been barred from travelling overseas.
“The types of arrests and roundups that you cite have not gone unnoticed by us”, he said.
Soldiers involved in a coup attempt surrender on Bosphorus bridge on July 16, 2016, in Istanbul, Turkey.
It also raises questions about the effectiveness of the military, courts and other institutions being purged.
“I’ve heard from the secretary that we have to stay in Istanbul and aren’t allowed to leave – no idea how that would be enforced but as our work permit cards have ID numbers and workplaces written on them, it’s possible”.
“Under global law, there are certain rights, like the right to a fair trial and bans on torture and discrimination, which can never be suspended or limited in any way”, said Amnesty Turkey researcher Andrew Gardner. “People are very sensitive and we have to act very sensibly and sensitively”.
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Officials have raised the death toll from the violence surrounding the coup attempt to 240 government supporters and at least 24 coup plotters. The coup apparently originated from outside the chain of command, but the number of military officers implicated in the plot suggests a body blow for the cohesion and, perhaps, morale of Turkey’s forces.
