The July 15 coup attempt was Turkey’s second War of Independence, Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said August 7 during his speech at a Democracy and Martyrs’ Rally in Istanbul.
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“Our people have proven that our country can deter all internal and external conspiracies”, said Erdogan, addressing more than five million people gathered in Istanbul answering Erodgan’s call to condemn last month’s failed coup attempt.
The government has launched a sweeping crackdown in the aftermath, targeting followers of US-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen, who the government blames for the attempted coup.
Opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu, in a rare appearance at a rally with Erdogan, said the failed coup opened a “new door of compromise” and said politics must be kept out of mosques, courthouses and barracks.
Speaking of the possibility of restoring the death penalty, the president vowed once again to approve the decision to be taken by the parliament. “There the question is whether new negotiation chapters will be opened with Turkey, and I am against it”, Mr Kurz said in an interview with Austrian daily Kurier, threatening to block the unanimous agreement required by the council.
“Today there is the death penalty in the majority of the world”, he said, adding that capital punishment had been legal in Turkey until 2004, though the last execution took place in 1984.
“If anyone among them is linked with terrorism. we will respond to Turkey’s demands”, Nazarbayev told reporters during a joint press conference with Erdogan. “We will love each other not for rank or title, but for Allah”, said president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, standing on a 60 metre stage framed by two platforms and draped with massive national flags and banners depicting the president himself, as well as Turkey’s founding father, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk.
Almost 15,000 police will be providing security at the event, which the state-run Anadolu news agency estimates could be attended by millions.
In his Sunday interview with TASS, Erdogan also once again criticized the European Union for what he called a nonfulfillment of its obligations to Turkey for 53 years. Tass reported the two leaders will meet in the Russian city of Saint Petersburg in an attempt to ease tensions after Turkey shot down a Russian fighter jet near the Syrian border last November. After the incident, Russian Federation imposed a number sanctions against Turkey, including a food import embargo, a ban on charter flights to Turkey, the introduction of a visa regime, as well as the prohibition of hiring of Turkish citizens.
“This will be a historic visit, a fresh start”.
Amid the cooling of ties with the west, Erdogan is due to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday in St Petersburg for talks meant to end a period of tension after Turkey downed a Russian fighter jet near the Syrian border last November. “Only in partnership with Russian Federation will we be able to settle the crisis in Syria”, Erdogan said.
Ankara has claimed that Gulen is the mastermind behind the failed coup, but Gulen denies all knowledge of it.
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Turkish officials have angrily rejected suggestions the purges are out of proportion, accusing Western critics of failing to grasp the magnitude of the threat to the Turkish state and of being more concerned about the rights of coup plotters than the brutality of the events themselves.
