Following Friday’s failed coup attempt in Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has declared a three month state of emergency which allows the President and Cabinet to bypass the word of parliament during the process of passing new laws; a change that could see the President holding even more power and increasing the authoritarianism in the country. Worldwide doubts persist that the democracy and freedom in the country are being threatened and that the leadership is leaning closer towards a dictatorship.
Those who died fighting against the coup on Friday night and Saturday morning have been praised by Erdogan and were deemed “martyrs”. According to the government, 246 people were killed in fighting the coup. The German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier urged the Turkish government to remain within the boundaries of the rule of law. “Only provable involvement in illegal acts, not suspected political leanings, should trigger governmental action” Steinmeier stated.
The coup attempt has been blamed on self-exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen, who currently lives in the US. He was once an ally of Erdogan whose followers run a global network of schools, the Gulenist movement is one that holds a significant amount of power. Mr Erdogan called for Gulen to be extradited to Turkey, however, the US Secretary of State John Kerry claimed there needed to be sufficient evidence of Gulen’s involvement rather than baseless assumptions in order for an extradition to take place.
Since the attempt, over 50,000 state employees have been sacked or suspended and 99 military officers have been charged. The officials are continuing their action against university employees and people working in the field of education by shutting down schools, banning foreign travel for academics and forcing university faculty heads into resignation.
