A day after Turkey dismissed more than 2,400 military personnel, its Supreme Military Council gathered in a hastily planned meeting for appointing their replacements.
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Turkey continues to demand the US extradite Fethullah Gülen, a cleric living in exile in Pennsylvania whom it accuses of being behind the coup attempt July 15 that left at least 290 people dead. Special Operations Command and one of the most respected officers in uniform. “I am concerned about what the impact is on those relationships as we kind of continue to move forward”. Who are you? Know your place!
“You are taking the side of coup plotters instead of thanking this state for defeating the coup attempt”, Mr Erdogan said in angry remarks at a military center in Golbasi near Ankara, where air strikes left dozens dead during the failed putsch on 15 July.
Press freedom in Turkey has always been under threat – Can Dundar, the editor of the Cumhuriyet newspaper, was jailed for five years in May after his paper published evidence that Turkey was smuggling weaponry to Islamist terror groups in Syria.
The “African purge” of Turkey’s coup plotters started in Somalia where the government ordered all charities linked to Gulen to leave the country. The power was restored five days later. It is a central part of the US -led military operation against Daesh, hosting USA troops and warplanes at İncirlik Air Base, from which the United States flies sorties against Daesh militants in Iraq and Syria.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu also criticized the USA official’s comments, saying the jailed officers are “not the only ones with the capacity to fight” the Islamic State group.
She said dozens of incidents had been reported to police and that similar incidents had occurred in neighbouring Germany – which has Europe’s largest Turkish community.
Gen. Joseph Votel, commander of U.S. Central Command.
According to DW, relations between Ankara and Berlin have been under pressure in recent months, with a series of diplomatic blows being exchanged, ranging from Germany’s acknowledgement of Turkish culpability in the Armenian genocide, to Ankara’s attempts to obtain European Union membership.
Turkish officials have said they believe the coup plot was put into force in haste before the council in August, when many officers suspected of links to Gulen would have been discharged. He said that the last time Defense Secretary Ashton Carter spoke with Turkish Defense Minister Fikri Isik was on July 19.
Turkey’s government has repeatedly said the deadly coup attempt, which martyred at least 246 people and injured almost 2,200 others, was organized by followers of US -based preacher Fetullah Gulen. Gulen, who is based in Pennsylvania, condemned the coup and denied Erdoğan’s accusations.
USA -based cleric Fethullah Gulen.
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He made clear that the main “putschist” to him was Gulen. More than 18,000 people have been detained; close to 50,000 people have had their passports revoked and around 66,000 people in the wider civil service have been suspended from their jobs.
