Turkey also detained a senior aide to the US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen whom it blames for the coup attempt aimed at ousting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, an official said yesterday.
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The leader of Turkey’s main parliamentary opposition, the Republican People’s Party (CHP), has harshly condemned the July 15 coup during a major rally on Sunday in Istanbul.
Following a failed July 15 coup by renegade military units, Turkey has carried out a widespread crackdown on the army, police, judiciary and educational institutions.
Despite the high tensions since the coup attempt, the mood at the Istanbul rally was strongly patriotic.
“Turkey is on democracy watch”.
Reinforcing that message, the YAS meeting – which usually takes place every August – will be held this time in the presidential palace, not as is customary at the headquarters of the military General Staff.
Amnesty said that, as a member of the Council of Europe, Turkey is obligated to allow visits from the CPT, which Amnesty says is the only independent group with the authority to conduct arranged visits to all detention facilities in Turkey.
“There will no longer be a presidential guard, there is no objective, there is no need”, Yildirim said, speaking to A Haber channel.
His critics fear he is using the aborted coup to wage an indiscriminate crackdown on dissent.
The decree extends from four to 30 days the period in which suspects can be detained.
The state of emergency, and the mechanisms being set up to enforce it, are aimed against the Turkish government’s bitterest enemy, a USA -based cleric named Fethullah Gulen it accuses of engineering the failed July 15 coup.
A presidential official quoted by Reuters said Halis Hanci, described as Fethullah Gulen’s right-hand man, had been “captured”.
President Tayyip Erdogan has accused Gulen of building a “state within a state” and of plotting to overthrow Turkey’s government, charges that the 75-year-old cleric denied.
A week after renegade soldiers tried to oust him with guns, tanks and F16s, Erdogan’s government has rounded up or sacked tens of thousands of perceived state enemies, including nearly 300 officers of the guard shielding his Ankara palace.
Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi has warned Turkey over the mass arrest, saying “a country that jails its own university professors and journalists imprisons its future”.
Its leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu told the crowd that, amid all the turmoil, “the parliament stood proudly, Turkey stood proudly, lawmakers stood proudly, people in this square have stood proudly, and democracy won!”
“Come here and see how serious this is”, EU Minister Omer Celik said at a foreign media briefing. “Those who look at Turkey from far away think it is a Pokemon game”, he added, referring to a viral smartphone game with Japanese cartoon characters.
At least 246 people, including civilians and security personnel, were killed – and almost 2,200 injured – during the coup attempt.
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Officials confirmed that the 1,200 military personnel freed had been released due to lack of evidence linking them with the coup plot.
