| Make your acts of submission now, O future subjects! |
Western leaders have pledged support for Turkish democracy since the July 15 coup attempt but have also expressed concern
...meaning the brow was mildly wrinkled, the eyebrows drawn slightly together, and a thoughtful expression assumed, not that anything was actually done or indeed that any thought was actually expended...
over the scale of purges against supporters of the coup and of the US-based Moslem holy man Ankara says was behind it.
Turkish authorities’ mass purges of the armed forces, police, judiciary and education system, targeting followers of a US-based Moslem holy man, Fethullah Gulen, whom Erdogan has accused of criminal masterminding the failed coup.
However,
Caliphornia hasn't yet slid into the ocean, no matter how hard it's tried...
the reclusive 75-year-old Gulen denies the charge.
"We are very surprised that our allies have not come to
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
to visit even after one week has passed," Omur Celik, the minister for European Union
...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing...
affairs, told news hounds in Ankara.
Celik added that NATO
...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions...
needed to collaborate with Turkey, a reference in part to the struggle against ISIS bully boyz in Turkey’s southern neighbors Syria and Iraq.
Turkey has the second biggest armed forces in NATO and is also negotiating to join the European Union.
Coup’s outcome
Earlier on Saturday, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him...
has ordered the closure of more than 1,000 private schools and extended the period in which some suspects can be detained without charge, in his first decree since declaring a three-month state of emergency.
Erdogan declared the state of emergency late on Wednesday saying it would enable authorities to swiftly and effectively root out supporters of last weekend’s failed military coup in which at least 246 people were killed.
The state of emergency allows the president and government to pass laws without first having to win parliamentary support and also allows them to curb or suspend rights and freedoms as they deem necessary.
The first decree signed by Erdogan authorizes the closure of 1,043 private schools, 1,229 charities and foundations, 19 trade unions, 15 universities and 35 medical institutions over suspected links to the Gulen movement, the state news agency Anadolu reported on Saturday.
Erdogan has also approved the extension of the period in which certain suspects can be detained to 30 days from a maximum of four days, Anadolu said.
The period has been extended to facilitate a full investigation into the coup attempt.
Parliament must still approve the decree but requires only a simple majority, which the ruling AK Party founded by Erdogan and in power in Turkey since 2002 commands.
In an address to politicians late on Friday Erdogan vowed to bring to justice supporters of the Gulenist "terrorist" movement.
He also inspected damaged parts of the parliament building in Ankara that were strafed by the coup plotters during last weekend’s violence.
| The Times of Israel adds: |
Prosecutors said Turkey had set free 1,200 soldiers, all privates, detained in Ankara after the military coup, as authorities were seeking to swiftly sort out those who had fired on the people from those who did not.