Therefore, at least in the near term, there is little chance that Turkey would launch a large-scale military operation or act too aggressively and upset the Russian and Syrian governments.
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In the wake of the botched uprising, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has swiftly moved to entrench his power, arresting, sacking and suspending swathes of Turkey’s workforce.
“In a country where our youths are killed with tanks and bombs, if we stay silent, as political people we will be held responsible in the afterlife”, Erdogan said, pointing out that capital punishment exists around the world, including in the United States and China.
But the USA president, echoing concerns voiced by other Western governments, urged that “the investigations and prosecution of the coup’s perpetrators be conducted in ways that reinforce public confidence in democratic institutions and the rule of law”.
The failed putsch left more than 300 people dead.
Kerry said that North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, which Turkey has been a member of since 1952, “has a requirement with respect to democracy, and North Atlantic Treaty Organisation will indeed measure very carefully what is happening”.
Erdogan’s government said it has fired almost 22,000 education ministry workers, mostly teachers, taken steps to revoke the licenses of 21,000 other teachers at private schools and sacked or detained half a dozen university presidents in a campaign to root out alleged supporters of a USA -based Muslim cleric blamed for the failed insurrection.
Turkey submitted a dossier of documents about Mr Gulen, who lives in exile in Pennsylvania, to the Justice Department on Tuesday.
Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, meanwhile, reflected the triumphant mood of authorities.
“Critics are saying that Erdogan has cast a much wider net than anyone could be involved in this coup”, she says.
Gulen has strongly denied the government’s charges, suggesting that Friday’s attempted coup could have been staged as a pretext for the Erdogan government to seize even more power.
An official at the education ministry said: “The licences of 21,000 teachers working in privately-run institutions have been cancelled”. Turkish media, in rapid-fire reports, said the Ministry of Education fired 15,200 people across the country, the Interior Ministry fired 8,777 employees and Turkey’s Board of Higher Education requested the deans’ resignations. Roughly 100 intelligence officials were also suspended.
Thousands of police offices, judges and officials suspected to have had a hand in the coup have also been dismissed from their posts.
The military has about 620,000 troops and the police has about 250,000 members.
Turkey’s government has responded to Friday’s failed military coup with vows of harsh retribution as it continues a purge of its suspected opponents this week.
The fight against coup plotters “should not be turned into a witch hunt”, Ozev said.
Police officers escort admiral Atilla Demirhan, front, and a group of millitary personal detained in Mersin, Turkey, Tuesday, July 19, 2016. “Now you’re removing another 125 general officers”. After enduring a string of horrific terrorist attacks, the most recent less than a month before at the very airport that was shut down over the weekend, the black eye from these events and reactions they will provoke are hard to estimate at this point.
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Turkey’s main religious body has banned all imams in the country from holding services for military personnel killed supporting the attempted coup on July 15.
