Organizers played the Turkish and German national anthems and held a minute of silence for the victims of the coup as Sunday’s rally got underway. The slogan of the demonstration is “Yes to democracy. No to the coup”. The coup that failed between July 15 and 16 was the fifth intervention by the military in government since 1960. Ankara has also increased pressure on Washington to extradite US -based Fetullah Gulen, named by the Turkish government as the mastermind of the attempted putsch.
Advertisement
Gulen, who has being in self-imposed exile for years in the United States, denies the accusations and condemns the coup.
The Turkish Football Federation said in a statement on its website Sunday that every member of all its committees had tendered their resignations “for the well-being of the ongoing security investigation”.
Turkey’s soccer federation says all members of its committees have resigned to help the investigation into the movement of a US -based cleric who the country’s government says was behind the failed July 15 coup that left more than 200 people dead.
Erdogan’s spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said that prevented the showing of a message from the president and called for a “satisifactory explanation” from German officials.
Turkey has condemned a German court decision banning President Erdogan from addressing his supporters by video link at the rally in Cologne.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier on Saturday warned in an interview with Sueddeutsche Zeitung daily: “It is not right to bring Turkey’s domestic political tensions here. and intimidate people who have other political convictions”.
Up to 30,000 people were expected to attend a rally staged by groups including the pro-Erdogan Union of European-Turkish Democrats (UETD), police said.
On Sunday, thousands of people gathered in the German city of Cologne to denounce the failed coup and show support for Erdogan.
Meanwhile, skirmishes broke out at several smaller counter-demonstrations, with police moving in to separate around 80 right-wing nationalist Turks and 100 Kurds. Police plan to have 2,700 officers in place. Germany is home to the largest Turkish diaspora with three million residents in the country having Turkish ancestry. However, as the purges expanded, the allies also have become concerned about the scale of the crackdown.
The presidential decree puts the military commands directly under the defense ministry, puts all military hospitals under the authority of the health ministry, and also expands the Supreme Military Council the body that makes decisions on military affairs and appointments to include Turkey’s deputy prime ministers and its justice, foreign and interior ministers.
Advertisement
It comes after an announcement last week that more than 1,700 military personnel had been dishonourably discharged for their role in the putsch, which saw a faction of the military commandeer tanks, helicopters and warplanes in an attempt to topple the government.
