Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Tuesday (Aug 2) said last month’s attempted coup was a scenario drawn up from outside Turkey, in an allusion to possible foreign involvement in the plot.
Advertisement
Erdogan also said Turkey’s presidency of telecommunication and communication would be shut down as part of a nation-wide probe against the coup plotters linked to the FETO terror organization.
Cologne’s Sunday rally was attended by 30,000 to 40,000 people to denounce the abortive coup and show support for President Erdogan. Turkey’s relations with Germany, a country that has a sizeable population of people with Turkish roots, are also coming under strain.
A statement from Yildirim’s office said during talks, the Turkish prime minister told Dunford that his country wanted the U.S.to display its stance against the coup in a “clear and determined” way and renewed Turkey’s expectation that Gulen and USA -based members of his movement be extradited to Turkey soon.
The European Union (EU) should welcome the fact that the military coup attempt in Turkey was prevented, TRT Haber news channel quoted Turkey’s Minister for EU Affairs Omer Celik as saying August 3.
Similarly, Sweden said Wednesday it won’t send back failed asylum-seekers from Turkey who are Gulen supporters and who have “reliable connections” to the attempted coup.
He asked rhetorically how the United States and Turkey could be strategic partners when “you can still host someone whose extradition I have asked for?”
Erdogan complained about the request for evidence, saying: “We did not request documents for terrorists that you wanted returned”.
Turkish authorities stepped up pressure on the United States to extradite Gulen, sending a new package of documents to the American authorities, Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said.
Foreign Minister Paolo Gentiloni said that magistrates and law enforcement were fully engaged in fighting the Mafia “and don’t need any one’s encouragement”. In Turkey, almost 70,000 people have been suspended from their jobs on suspicion of being involved in the movement.
“We have intelligence that he could flee to a third country”, the state-run Anadolu Agency reported.
“I would like to say that there had been too little understanding in Europe on what challenges this has caused to the democratic institutions and the state institutions of Turkey”, he said, adding that this needed to be dealt with.
Italy’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Paolo Gentiloni, noted that in his country there was “full respect of the autonomy of the judiciary” and that together with the police it has worked successfully in the past against the mafia.
Advertisement
The complaint, which has to be accepted by prosecutors before any action is taken, came days after Erdogan told Votel to “know your place” after he expressed concern that the post-coup crackdown may affect the fight against Islamic State militants.
