The convention allows countries to temporarily suspend some rights during times of grave public emergency or war.
Advertisement
“The country and our democracy came under attack on Friday evening”, a senior Turkish official said following the announcement.
However, the article stipulates that measures must be strictly proportionate and not discriminate against people based on ethnicity, religion or social group.
Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said Turkey would follow France’s lead on responding to issues of national security.
“A declaration of a state of emergency is not against the ECHR”, he said, adding Turkey would announce its decision to suspend the ECHR through a statement.
Germany’s foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, urged the Turkish government to maintain both the rule of law and a sense of proportion in its response to the coup attempt.
Erdogan said the move was necessary to allow “swift and effective” measures against the Gulen movement, a liberal Islamic movement started by Turkish preacher Fethullah Gulen who now resides in the United States.
Erdogan announced the state of emergency in a live broadcast in front of his government ministers after a almost five-hour meeting of the National Security Council.
Concern is growing over respect for the rule of law nearly a week after the coup attempt that left over 300 people dead and raised fears of chaos in the key North Atlantic Treaty Organisation member.
“The government has abused existing laws, the state of emergency gives them increased scope to continue on this unsafe path”, Gardner warned.
Turkey’s government has said the attempted coup was organized by followers of USA -based cleric Fetullah Gulen, who is accused of a long-running campaign to overthrow the state through infiltrating into Turkish institutions, particularly the military, police and judiciary, forming a “parallel state”.
Tanks and fighter jets commandeered by elite military troops rolled out into the streets of Ankara and Istanbul during the attempted putsch.
Erdogan said there had been significant failures in intelligence leading up to the attempted military coup and that the armed forces would need to be quickly restructured.
The Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), called the state of emergency evidence of the desire for the ruling elite to run the country with a “coup-like, authoritative mentality”. The purge also extended to civil servants in the environment and sports ministries. Previously, the military had said more than 100 coup plotters were killed.
Advertisement
The Turkish leader has been accused of increasing authoritarianism in recent years, appointing loyalists to the bureaucracy, closing or prosecuting opposition media outlets and failing to crack down on corruption.
