ANKARA (Reuters) – The Turkish government has agreed to extend its state of emergency as Turkey fights to wipe out “terrorist organizations” following July’s attempted coup, deputy prime minister and government spokesman Numan Kurtulmus said on Monday.
Speaking at a press conference following the cabinet meeting, Kurtulmus said the extension will come into effect on October 19, when the first three months expire.
(Reporting by Tulay Karadeniz; Writing by Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Luke Baker)
ISTANBUL, Sept 13 (Reuters) – Turkey has made a formal request to the United States for the arrest of U.S.-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen on charges of orchestrating an attempted military coup on July 15, Turkish broadcaster NTV said on Tuesday.
Turkey blames members of Gulen’s religious movement for the failed putsch two months ago, in which rogue soldiers commandeered tanks and fighters jets, bombing parliament and seizing bridges in a bid to take over power.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan discussed the issue with U.S. President Barack Obama at the G20 summit in China earlier this month. A senior U.S. administration official said at the time that Obama had explained to Erdogan that the decision would be a legal, not a political one.
(Reporting by Seda Sezer and Tuvan Gumrukcu; Writing by Nick Tattersall)
ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkish authorities have suspended about 8,000 security personnel and more than 2,000 academics, adding to a purge of people suspected of having links to perpetrators of a failed coup, the Official Gazette said on Friday.
Since the coup attempt in mid-July, in which rogue soldiers tried to topple President Tayyip Erdogan’s government, Turkey has removed 80,000 people from public duty and arrested many of them, accusing them of sympathizing with the plotters.
Of the security personnel removed in the latest purge, 323 were members of the gendarmerie and the rest police, according to the Official Gazette, in which the government publishes new laws and orders.
It said 2,346 more academics had been removed from universities. Hundreds of academics and others have already been swept from their posts, accused of links to U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who Erdogan says masterminded the coup.
About 3,300 judiciary officials have also been dismissed, leaving a depleted workforce to manage the legal process against a growing number of detainees.
The Gazette said retired judges and prosecutors would be allowed to return to work if they applied to do so in the next two months.
(Reporting by Ece Toksabay; Writing by Edmund Blair; editing by John Stonestreet)
ISTANBUL/ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkish authorities suspended 95 Istanbul police officers, including police chiefs, on Monday, broadcaster CNN Turk reported, the latest steps in a sweeping crackdown to target security forces following a failed coup last month.
About 80,000 people in the police, military, judiciary and civil service have been sacked or suspended since the failed July 15 coup, when a group of rogue soldiers attempted to topple the government. Turkey says followers of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen were behind the attempt.
Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile in rural Pennsylvania since 1999, denies the charge and has condemned the coup.
The 95 officers were suspended from duty at Istanbul police headquarters in Istanbul, CNN Turk said. No one was immediately available for comment at the Istanbul police headquarters.
Separately, photos published by state-run Anadolu Agency showed lorries draped with Turkish flags hauling armored vehicles, covered in tarpaulin, out of barracks in Istanbul and Ankara, to be taken to locations outside the cities.
Under a decision taken after last month’s coup, all military barracks within the two cities are to be moved elsewhere by Sept. 11.
Istanbul and Ankara are to be transferred outside the cities by Sept. 11. Anadolu said armored vehicles from the 66th mechanized infantry brigade were transported out of the Bastabya barracks in Istanbul. It said the transfer of military vehicles would continue.
Coup plotters had commandeered vehicles from the Bastabya barracks on the night of the coup, sending them to Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport and the police headquarters.
Turkey’s Supreme Military Council, which normally meets just twice a year, was to convene for the second time in a month on Tuesday as part of the government’s plan to overhaul the armed forces and bring it fully under civilian control.
Prime Minister Binali Yildirim was to chair the council meeting, starting at 10 a.m. (0700 GMT) on Tuesday, sources from his office said. No statement has yet been issued on the agenda of Tuesday’s meeting.
(Reporting by Daren Butler and Ercan Gurses; Editing by David Dolan and Richard Balmforth)
By Orhan Coskun and Ece Toksabay
ANKARA (Reuters) – Two Turkish military attaches in Greece fled to Italy, others were caught overseas and some diplomats were on the run after being recalled as part of an inquiry into last month’s failed military coup, Turkey’s foreign minister said on Thursday.
Turkey, which has NATO’s second-biggest armed forces, has dismissed or detained thousands of soldiers, including nearly half of its generals, since the July 15 coup bid, in which rogue troops commandeered tanks and warplanes in an attempt to seize power.
Western allies worry President Tayyip Erdogan is using the failed putsch and purge to tighten his grip on power. But many Turks are angered by what they see as a lack of Western sympathy over a violent coup in which 240 people died.
“Democracy rallies”, largely attended by Erdogan supporters but also some parts of the opposition, have been held night after night since the putsch. Pollster Metropoll said on Thursday its monthly survey showed a surge in approval for Erdogan to 68 percent in July from 47 percent a month earlier.
Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told private broadcaster NTV that two military attaches in Greece — a naval officer and an army officer — had fled by car and ferry to Italy, but that Turkish officials would seek their return.
Cavusoglu said a military attache based in Kuwait had also tried to escape through Saudi Arabia, but had been sent back, as well as two generals based in Afghanistan who had been caught in Dubai by UAE authorities and returned to Turkey.
The hunt for fugitive Turkish officers and officials overseas expands from the crackdown at home, where tens of thousands of troops, police, and bureaucrats have been detained, dismissed or investigated for alleged links to the coup, which authorities blame on U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen.
Gulen denies any involvement and has condemned the coup bid. But he says Erdogan is using the purges to shore up his own power in Turkey.
“TIME HAS RUN OUT”
“There are those who have escaped. There have been escapees among our diplomats as well,” Cavusoglu told NTV in an interview. “As of yesterday, time has run out for those initially called back. We will carry out the legal operations for those who have not returned.”
Interior Minister Efkan Ala was quoted on Thursday as saying almost 76,100 civil servants have now been suspended.
The Greek foreign ministry said the two attaches fled before Ankara asked them to return to Turkey, and before officials canceled their diplomatic passports.
U.S. officials told Reuters this week that a Turkish military officer on a U.S.-based assignment for NATO is also seeking asylum in the United States after being recalled by the government.
A total of 160 members of the military wanted in connection with the failed coup are still at large, including nine generals, officials have said.
One official said the foreign ministry sent instructions to Turkish diplomatic missions around the world where those suspected of links to the plotters were thought to be working, ordering them back to Ankara as part of the investigations.
Five employees of Turkey’s embassy in the Netherlands were recalled on suspicion of involvement with the Gulen movement, the Turkish charge d’affaires told the Algemeen Dagblad newspaper this week.
“It wasn’t the cook or the servants,” Kurtulus Aykan, acting head of Turkey’s mission to the Netherlands, was quoted as saying. “These were high-ranking staff members. Talented people, with whom I had an excellent working relationship. I suspected nothing. That’s the talent of this movement. They infiltrate silently.”
Cavusoglu has previously said around 300 members of the foreign ministry have been suspended since the coup plot, including two ambassadors. He said on Thursday two officials in Bangladesh fled to New York, and another official had fled to Japan through Moscow.
“We will return these traitors to Turkey,” Cavusoglu said.
“PARALLEL STATE”
Erdogan accuses the U.S.-based cleric Gulen of staging the attempted putsch, harnessing his extensive network of schools, charities and businesses built up in Turkey and abroad over decades to create a “parallel structure”.
The abortive July 15 coup and the subsequent purge of the military has raised concern about the stability of Turkey, a key member of the U.S.-led coalition fighting Islamic State and battling an insurgency at home by Kurdish militants.
Turkey has been angered by the Western response to the attempted coup, viewing Europe as more concerned about the rights of the plotters than the events themselves and the United States as reluctant to extradite Gulen.
That has chilled relations with Washington and the European Union, bringing repeated Turkish warnings about an EU deal to stem the flow of migrants. Erdogan has also repaired ties with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin, a detente Western officials worry may be used to pressure the West.
“Sooner or later the United States of America will make a choice. Either Turkey or FETO,” Erdogan told a rally late on Wednesday, using an abbreviation standing for the “Gulenist Terror Group” which is how Ankara refers to Gulen’s movement.
The purge inside Turkey also presses on. Turkey has canceled the work permits of 27,424 people working in the education sector as part of its investigations, Education Minister Ismet Yilmaz said on Thursday.
Ankara prosecutors on Thursday also ordered the detention of 648 judges and prosecutors suspended a day earlier, Hurriyet newspaper and broadcasters said. They are among 3,500 judges and prosecutors — a quarter of the national total — suspended in the coup probe, according to state-run Anadolu Agency.
(Additional reporting by Michele Kambas in Athens, Daria Sito-Sucic in Sarajevo, Thomas Escritt in Amsterdam; Writing by Patrick Markey; Editing by Nick Tattersall)
ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) – Russian President Vladimir Putin told his visiting Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan he hoped Ankara could fully restore order after a failed military coup last month, saying on Tuesday that Moscow always opposed unconstitutional actions.
Erdogan’s trip to Russia comes as Turkey’s relations with Europe and the United States are strained by what Ankara sees as Western concern about how it handled the abortive coup, in which more than 240 people were killed.
Putin, one of the first to call the Turkish leader to offer his support in the putsch’s aftermath, has positioned himself as a reliable ally even though ties between Moscow and Ankara were thrown into crisis by Turkey shooting down a Russian military jet near the Syrian border late last year.
Welcoming Erdogan in a Tsarist-era palace just outside his home town, Putin signaled on Tuesday he was ready to improve relations with Turkey, which he said had gone from a historical high point to a very low level.
“Your visit today, which you made despite the really complex domestic political situation in Turkey, shows we all want to restart our dialogue and restore our relations,” said Putin, in preliminary remarks before the two men held talks.
Putin then offered Erdogan moral support over last month’s failed military coup.
“I want to again say that it’s our principled position that we are always categorically against any attempts at unconstitutional actions,” said Putin.
“I want to express the hope that under your leadership the Turkish people will cope with this problem (the coup’s aftermath) and that order and constitutional legality will be restored.”
Putin said the two men would discuss how to restore trade and economic ties and cooperation against terrorism.
Russia imposed trade sanctions on Turkey in the wake of the shooting down of its jet and the number of Russian tourists visiting the country fell by 87 percent in the first half of 2016.
Erdogan said Turkey was entering a “very different period” in its relations with Russia, and that solidarity between the two countries would help the resolution of regional problems.
He may also hope his trip to Russia will give pause for thought to some in the West who are nervous about the prospect of a rapprochement between Moscow and Ankara at a time when Turkey’s ties with NATO and the EU are under strain.
(Reporting by Olesya Astakhova/Andrew Osborn in MOSCOW and by Ece Toksabay, Tuvan Gumrukcu and Nick Tattersal in TURKEY; Editing by Alexander Winning)
By Humeyra Pamuk and Nick Tattersall
ISTANBUL (Reuters) – President Tayyip Erdogan told a rally of more than one million people on Sunday that July’s failed coup would be a milestone in building a stronger Turkey, defying Western criticism of mass purges and vowing to destroy those behind the putsch.
The “Democracy and Martyrs’ Rally” at the Yenikapi parade ground, built into the sea on the southern edge of Istanbul, was a show of strength by Erdogan, who has been angered by European criticism of his combative response to the coup and by U.S. reluctance to hand over the man he accuses of masterminding it.
Banners in a sea of red Turkish flags read “You are a gift from God, Erdogan” and “Order us to die and we will do it”. It was the first time in decades that opposition leaders joined a rally in support of the government, with pockets of secularists, nationalists and others alongside his core Islamist supporters.
“That night, our enemies who were rubbing their hands in anticipation of Turkey’s downfall woke up the next morning to the grief that things would be more difficult from now on,” Erdogan said of the July 15 abortive coup, drawing parallels to times past when Turkey was occupied by foreign forces.
“From now on, we will examine very carefully who we have under us. We will see who we have in the military, who we have in the judiciary, and throw the others out of the door.”
The parade ground, built to hold more than a million people, was overflowing, with the streets of surrounding neighborhoods clogged by crowds. One presidency official put the numbers at around five million and the event was broadcast live on public screens at smaller rallies across Turkey’s 81 provinces.
Since the coup bid, Turkish authorities have suspended, detained or placed under investigation tens of thousands of people, including soldiers, police, judges, journalists, medics and civil servants, prompting concern among Western allies that Erdogan is using the events to tighten his grip on power.
Erdogan vowed to rid Turkey of the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whose followers in the security forces, judiciary and civil service he accuses of orchestrating the attempted power grab and of plotting to overthrow the state.
Erdogan said he would approve the restoration of the death penalty if parliament voted for it, a move which would sink any hopes of European Union membership. Shrugging off EU concerns, he said much of the rest of the world had capital punishment.
Gulen – an ally of Erdogan in the early years after his Islamist-rooted AK Party took power in 2002 – has denied any involvement in the coup, which came at a critical time for a NATO “frontline” state facing Islamist militant attacks from across the border in Syria and an insurgency by Kurdish rebels.
In a rare appearance at a public rally, military chief Hulusi Akar said the “traitors” behind the plot would be punished and he thanked civilians for their role in putting it down. Many of the more than 240 people killed on July 15 were civilians who tried to prevent the takeover of power.
The leader of the main secularist opposition, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, said a “new door of compromise” had been opened and that politics must be kept out of the mosques, courthouses and barracks. “There is a new Turkey after July 15,” he said.
“FREEDOM OR DEATH”
Erdogan, a polarizing figure seen by opponents as intolerant of dissent, invited the heads of the secularist and nationalist opposition parties to address the crowds in a display of national unity in defiance of Western criticism.
“We’re here to show that these flags won’t come down, the call to prayer won’t be silenced and our country won’t be divided,” said Haci Mehmet Haliloglu, 46, a civil servant who traveled from the Black Sea town of Ordu for the rally.
“This is something way beyond politics, this is either our freedom or death,” he said, a large Turkish flag over his shoulder and a matching baseball cap on his head.
Turkey’s top Muslim cleric and chief rabbi also attended. But the pro-Kurdish HDP, the third-largest party in parliament, was not invited due to its alleged links to Kurdish militants, prompting anger on social media from its supporters.
The brutality of July 15, in which rogue soldiers commandeered fighter jets, helicopters and tanks, shocked a nation that last saw a violent military power grab in 1980. Even Erdogan’s opponents saw his leadership as preferable to a successful coup renewing the cycle of military interventions that dogged Turkey in the second half of the 20th century.
“Erdogan has been brutal and unfair to us in the past, but I believe he has now understood the real importance of the republic’s values,” said Ilhan Girit, 44, a musician and CHP supporter, carrying a flag of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, founder of the modern secular republic.
A convoy of nationalists on motorbikes passed as he spoke.
Such solidarity may not last. There are already opposition concerns that the restructuring of the military lacks parliamentary oversight and is going too far, with thousands of soldiers discharged, including around 40 percent of generals.
WESTERN CRITICISM
The extent of the purges in Turkey, which has NATO’s second largest armed forces and aspires to membership of the European Union, has drawn criticism in the West.
In comments published on Sunday, the leader of Germany’s liberal Free Democrats said he saw parallels between Erdogan’s behavior and the aftermath of the Reichstag fire in 1933, portrayed by the Nazis as a Communist plot against the government and used by Adolf Hitler to justify massively curtailing civil liberties.
Turkish officials have angrily rejected suggestions that 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.
Amid the cooling of ties with the West, Erdogan is due to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday in St Petersburg for talks intended to end a period of tension after Turkey downed a Russian fighter jet near the Syrian border last November.
“At the talks with my friend Vladimir, I believe, a new page in bilateral relations will be opened. Our countries have a lot to do together,” Erdogan told the TASS news agency in an interview published on Sunday.
In Washington on Sunday several hundred people clad in red and waving Turkish flags gathered in front of the White House in support of Erdogan and to demand that U.S. President Barack Obama deport Gulen to Turkey.
“He (Erdogan) has made some mistakes but he is not a dictator,” said Okan Sakar, 35, a Turkish tax inspector currently studying in the United States.
(Additional reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu in Istanbul, Caroline Copley in Berlin, Maria Kiselyova in Moscow, Jason Lange in Washington; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Ralph Boulton and Gareth Jones)
By Amy Sawitta Lefevre and Andrew R.C. Marshall
BANGKOK, Thailand (Reuters) – Thailand votes on Sunday for a new constitution that aims to subdue political parties and give the generals a permanent role in overseeing the country’s economic development, senior military officers say.
The kingdom of Thailand has a long history of coups. But interviews with officers, including two generals, show the military’s ambition is to make such interventions unnecessary by weakening political parties and maintaining permanent influence over elected governments.
Future governments, they said, would be legally obliged to follow a 20-year national development plan set by the army.
Under the proposed charter, which would replace one torn up following the May 2014 coup, a junta-appointed Senate with seats reserved for military commanders would check the powers of elected lawmakers.
“They will be sitting there to make sure all the reforms will be carried out and at the same time make sure the newly elected government does exactly what they’re supposed to do,” General Thawip Netniyom, chief of Thailand’s National Security Council (NSC), told Reuters.
The generals, he said, would be baby-sitting, “somewhat”.
One clause in the draft constitution would allow an unelected prime minister to take power in the event of a political crisis – that’s what happened in 2014 when army chief Prayuth Chan-ocha led a coup against the elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra and afterward became prime minister.
PREEMINENT INSTITUTION
Thailand’s military has always been powerful, but the 2014 coup established it as the nation’s preeminent institution – arguably more powerful than even the monarchy, which faces uncertain times as the health of revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej, 88, fades.
It has long been assumed the military is keeping a tight grip on power to oversee the royal succession. But interviews with the generals disclosed the new constitution is part of a fundamental political restructuring guaranteeing the military a permanent role in how Thailand is run.
The draft constitution allows the military and its allies to “legally compel” future governments to execute a 20-year plan rather than their own short-sighted populist policies, said Major General Weerachon Sukondhapatipak, the deputy government spokesman.
No Thai government has ever adopted a 20-year national strategy, never mind implemented it.
The plan itself is still a work in progress, said Weerachon. Executed by both the public and private sector, it will be divided into five-year periods and provide a blueprint for reforms on social, economic and political issues.
Since helping to overthrow an absolute monarchy in what was then the Kingdom of Siam in 1932, the military has staged 19 coups, 12 of them successful, and has provided 12 of its 29 prime ministers in that time.
ROADMAP TO ELECTIONS
The junta has appeared particularly sensitive to criticism in the lead-up to the vote. Dozens of activists and politicians have been arrested in recent weeks for campaigning against the constitution.
No such restrictions apply to the “yes” vote, with the junta broadcasting songs and television programs to drum up support for the constitutional referendum.[L4N1A72VE]
It is unclear what will happen if the draft is rejected, which would raise questions about the junta’s roadmap to a promised general election next year.. Polls show a large majority of Thailand’s 50 million voters are undecided.
Interviews with Thai officers show that while the military has lost faith in civilian rule, it recognizes that democracy – or the military’s version of it – is integral to Thailand’s development and international image.
Elected politicians, said the officers, could never be trusted to act in the national interest because voters only chose parties that promise wasteful populist policies.
“Every government policy was based on its own political interest, and that leads to many problems – corruption, inequality, dispute,” said Weerachon, the deputy spokesman.
If recent governments had followed the long-term plans of technocrats, rather than pursuing their own policies, “Thailand would be a developed country by now,” he said.
The draft constitution would preclude the need for any future coups because the military, which historically has operated independently of civilian rule, would have indirect but decisive power over future governments.
“The idea is to never have another coup,” said Thawip. “We wish that this won’t need to happen.”
CONTROLLING GOVERNMENT
It is a radical vision, and one that signals the rise of a politically ambitious class of officers not seen for a generation. They were forged by the previous coup in 2006, which overthrew populist Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
That coup’s failure to bring stability to Thailand ultimately convinced the military to get more involved in politics, not less, and to rewrite the rules of the game.
Key personnel in the 2006 coup belong to a military faction nicknamed the “Eastern Tigers,” formally known as the 2nd Infantry Division of the First Army Region. Coup leader Prayuth and his powerful deputy, Ge.l Prawit Wongsuwan, are both from “Eastern Tigers” regiments.
Thawip said it didn’t matter which political party won the next election, “as long as we make sure they will follow the new constitution.” The aim of the constitution was “to keep watching or controlling the government’s actions (to) make sure they aren’t doing anything that undemocratic.”
The Jakkapong army camp in Thailand’s eastern Prachin Buri province, where the Eastern Tigers hail from, is the cradle of this ambitious new generation of officers.
At the camp soldiers carry out morning drills amid signs saying ‘Strong Army, Stable Country’.
Obedience, said Major Pongpon Wijitkarn, a drill instructor at the camp, is the first quality demanded of new recruits and one the military demands of civilian politicians.
“If we soldiers are ordered to do something, we do it,” Pongpon said as his men marched up and down beneath a tropical sun. “If politicians don’t follow through with something, we can stand over them and ensure that they follow through with their promises.”
(Additional reporting by Panarat Thepgumpanat; Editing by Bill Tarrant)
ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkish police have raided the offices of the national science research council, an official said on Wednesday, as authorities widen an investigation into followers of the U.S.-based cleric accused of masterminding last month’s coup attempt.
Broadcaster NTV earlier reported that police raided the offices of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (Tubitak) on Wednesday and detained “many” people.
However, a Tubitak official told Reuters the raid had happened on Sunday, adding he did not have any details about the number of detentions. He declined to comment further.
Tubitak funds science research projects in universities and the private sector and employs more than 1,500 researchers, according to its website.
More than 60,000 people in the military, judiciary, civil service and education have been detained, suspended or placed under investigation following the July 15 coup attempt, prompting fears that President Tayyip Erdogan is using the events to crack down on dissent.
Turkey’s government says the coup attempt was orchestrated by followers of Fethullah Gulen, a Muslim cleric who has lived in self-imposed exile in the United States since 1999. Gulen denies the charge and has condemned the coup.
More than 230 people, not including coup plotters, died and thousands were wounded as mutinous soldiers commandeered fighter jets, helicopters and tanks in the failed attempt to topple the government.
(Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk and Can Sezer; Writing by David Dolan; Editing by Nick Tattersall)
By Tulay Karadeniz and Seda Sezer
ANKARA/ISTANBUL (Reuters) – President Tayyip Erdogan angrily rejected Western criticism of purges under way in Turkey’s military and other state institutions after a failed coup, suggesting some in the United States were on the side of the plotters.
The purges target supporters of U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, accused by Ankara of masterminding the July 15-16 coup. Turkey’s Western allies condemned the coup, in which at least 246 people were killed and more than 2,000 injured, but they have been rattled by the scale of the crackdown.
The director of U.S. national intelligence, James Clapper, said on Thursday the purges were harming the fight against Islamic State in Syria and Iraq by sweeping away Turkish officers who had worked closely with the United States.
The head of U.S. Central Command, General Joseph Votel, said he believed some of the military figures whom the United States had worked with were in jail.
Speaking at a special forces headquarters in Ankara badly damaged by violence on the night of the coup, Erdogan on Friday condemned Votel’s remarks.
“Instead of thanking this country which repelled a coup attempt, you take the side of the coup plotters. The putschist is in your country already,” Erdogan said, referring to Gulen, who denies any involvement in the coup attempt.
“They (the critics) say … ‘we worry for (Turkey’s) future’. But what are these gentlemen worried about? Whether the numbers of detained and arrested will increase? If they are guilty, they will increase,” said Erdogan, who narrowly escaped capture and possible death on the night of the coup.
Ankara wants Washington to extradite Gulen, once a close ally of Erdogan and now an arch foe, to Turkey.
Asked about the U.S. comments on losing Turkish interlocutors, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim echoed Erdogan’s feisty tone: “This is a confession. If the Gulenist generals are their friends, they are in the same class.”
Yildirim also said Turkey would shut down an air base near Ankara which served as a hub for the coup plotters as well as all military barracks used by them.
MILITARY SHAKE-UP
Turkey announced late on Thursday a major shake-up of its armed forces, NATO’s second largest, with the promotion of 99 colonels to the rank of general or admiral and the dishonorable discharge of nearly 1,700 military personnel over their alleged roles in the coup.
About 40 percent of all generals and admirals have been dismissed since the coup.
Defence Minister Fikri Isik told broadcaster NTV on Friday the shake-up in the military was not yet over, adding that military academies would now be a target of “cleansing”.
The purges have also hit government ministries, schools and universities, the police, civil service, media and business.
The number of public sector workers removed from their posts since the coup attempt now stands at more than 66,000, including some 43,000 people in education, the state-run Anadolu news agency reported on Friday.
Interior Minister Efkan Ala said more than 18,000 people had been detained over the failed coup, and that 50,000 passports had been canceled. The labor ministry said it was investigating 1,300 staff over their possible involvement.
Erdogan says Gulen harnessed his extensive network of schools, charities and businesses, built up in Turkey and abroad over decades, to create a secretive “parallel state” that aimed to take over the country.
Erdogan’s critics say he is using the purges to crack down indiscriminately on dissent and to tighten his grip on power.
With long land borders with Syria and Iraq, Turkey is a central part of the U.S.-led military operation against Islamic State. As home to millions of Syrian refugees, it is also the European Union’s partner in a deal reached last year to halt the biggest flow of migrants into Europe since World War Two.
Turkey hosts U.S. troops and warplanes at Incirlik Air Base, from which the United States flies sorties against Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria. Those air operations were temporarily halted following the coup attempt.
Attempting to reassure the United States, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Friday that Turkey’s armed forces, “cleansed” of their Gulenist elements, would prove more “trustworthy … and effective” allies against Islamic State.
Nevertheless, there is a growing anti-U.S. mood in Turkey which is likely to harden further if Washington refuses to extradite Gulen.
Several hundred flag-waving protesters staged a peaceful protest march near the Incirlik base on Thursday, chanting “Allahu Akbar” (God is greatest) and “Damn the U.S.A”, the pro-government Yeni Safak newspaper reported. The protesters burned a U.S. flag.
“POWER POISONING”
The crackdown on Gulenists pressed on unabated on Friday.
In the central city of Kayseri, a stronghold of Erdogan’s ruling Islamist-rooted AK Party, police detained the chairman of furniture-to-cables conglomerate Boydak Holding and two company executives as part of the investigation into the “Gulenist Terror Group”, Anadolu reported.
Prosecutors in the Aegean coastal city of Izmir issued orders to detain 200 police on Friday as part of the investigation targeting Gulenists, the Dogan news agency said.
In the Netherlands, a spokeswoman for the Gulenist community said supporters feared for their safety after dozens of death threats and acts of arson and vandalism in Dutch towns and cities in the past two weeks. Saniye Calkin said supporters in neighboring Germany were reporting similar incidents.
Germany is home to Europe’s largest Turkish diaspora, while the Netherlands also has around half a million ethnic Turks.
Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania since 1999, again maintained his innocence during an interview with Italy’s Corriere della Sera newspaper, saying he had himself suffered from previous coups in Turkey.
Asked why his once-warm ties with Erdogan and the AK Party had turned sour, Gulen said: “It appears that after staying in power for too long, (they) are suffering from power poisoning.”
Gulen, whose Hizmet (Service) movement stresses the need to embrace scientific progress and inter-faith dialogue, said he still strongly backed Ankara’s bid to join the EU, saying this would buttress democracy and human rights in Turkey.
(Additional reporting by Daren Butler and Nick Tattersall in Istanbul, Orhan Coskun in Ankara, Steve Scherer in Rome, Anthony Deutsch in Amsterdam; Writing by Gareth Jones; Editing by Nick Tattersall)
