Turkey coup: Erdogan announces state of emergency after failed rebellion

Ozturk, who has denied involvement and insisted he had tried to suppress the rebellion, appeared in video from Turkish TV looking bruised with a bandage over his ear.

Turkey’s presidential spokesman has rejected criticisms that came after the declaration of a state of emergency following last Friday’s failed coup. He added that it would be up to parliament to decide. And almost 60,000 civil service employees have been dismissed.

In a show of unity with the president, the leader of the opposition Nationalist Movement Party, Devlet Bahceli, said his party would back legislation to reintroduce the death penalty if it was put forward by the ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP.

“We thank our European friends for their support against the coup, however their sentences starting with “but” did not please us at all”, he said.

Erdogan’s government has accused the 75-year-old Gulen of being the mastermind of Friday’s failed military takeover in which at least 232 people were killed.

The Dogan agency reported that ten of them had now been remanded in custody by the courts.

As Western officials expressed alarm at the rapid roundup of so many by their key North Atlantic Treaty Organisation ally, Turkish government officials explained that the plotters in the military had been under investigation and launched their ill-planned operation out of panic.

The latest purges were meant to blunt the influence of Gulen, an Erodgan rival who has been in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania since the late 1990s and who the government has long accused of being behind a “parallel terrorist organization”. “We just also caution against any kind of overreach that goes beyond that”, U.S. State Department Deputy Spokesman Mark Toner told a news briefing Tuesday. He said the power cutoff was not yet “a limiting factor” in U.S.-led bombing runs and other missions over Iraq and Syria.

The purge of those deemed disloyal to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan widened on Tuesday to include teachers, university deans and the media.

Turkey has repeatedly named Gulen as the instigator of its turmoil and demands his extradition from the United States, which has said any such process must follow the law.

Though the Obama administration eventually offered explicit public backing for the “democratically-elected” government, a first statement by Secretary of State John F. Kerry, when the coup’s outcome was uncertain, supported only “stability and peace and continuity within Turkey”.

That is a tragedy, because five or 10 years ago Turkey seemed well on the way to being the sort of democracy, with free media and the rule of law, where a coup like this was simply inconceivable. Turkey abolished capital punishment in 2004 as part of its long-running bid to be admitted to the European Union – a bid that stands no chance if the death penalty is reintroduced.

Officials from the United States, France and Germany have also reportedly warned Erdogan to act within the law. “So this is sufficient ground”.

Thousands of pro-Erdogan supporters waving Turkish flags filled the main Kizilay Square in Ankara while similar scenes were seen in Taksim Square in Istanbul.

He said: “Will you take this opportunity to ensure that president Erdogan and his allies appreciate that press freedom and freedom of speech is one of the values that those behind this coup want to crush, and which he should seek to uphold?”