This article highlights the Turkish government’s specious claims about the attempted coup and its alleged planners and provides a counter-narrative.

Erdoğan’s claim and responses by Western governments and intelligence services

With the coup attempt ongoing, Erdoğan claimed, on national TV, that Fethullah Gülen, a retired preacher and a vocal Erdoğan critic, was the coup’s mastermind. Gülen condemned the attempt while it was in progress and denied any involvement. He challenged the Erdoğan government to allow for an international investigation into the event (Exhibit B). He pledged to abide by its ruling. Erdoğan did not respond to this call.

Western governments and observers have not accepted Erdoğan’s narrative of July 15th, either. In particular:

• Former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said that the Turkish government, as part of the extradition process, must link Gülen to the incident with evidence that withstands scrutiny in an American court. As of this writing, approximately one year after the incident, the Turkish Government has not submitted evidence that meets this criterion.

• James Clapper, former director of U.S. National Intelligence, said Gülen’s involvement in the coup didn’t pass the “smell test” of credibility.

• The United State House Intelligence Committee chairman Devin Nunes told Fox News that it was “hard to believe” that the U.S.-based Turkish cleric was behind the attempt.

• When asked by Der Spiegel whether Gülen was behind the coup, Bruno Kahl, Head of Germany’s BDN Foreign Intelligence Agency, responded, “Turkey has tried to convince us of that at every level but so far it has not succeeded.”

• The European Union Intelligence Center INTCEN’s report on the incident contradicted the Turkish government’s claim that Fethullah Gülen was behind the plot. The report concluded that the coup was mounted by a range of Mr. Erdoğan’s opponents. The Service found it unlikely that Gülen himself played a role in the attempt, according to the Times of London. It also determined Erdoğan’s purges were planned well before the incident.

• German Focus magazine reported in their July 2016 issue that British signals intelligence agency GCHQ intercepted communication between top Erdoğan brass about half an hour after shooting started that the coup would be blamed on Gülen and purges would start the next day.

• A report by the Foreign Affairs Committee of the British Parliament on UK-Turkish relations stated that the “UK government does not have any evidence that U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gülen organized Turkey’s July coup attempt.” The report went on to say:

Given the brutality of the events of 15 July, the severity of the charges made against the Gülenists, and the scale of the purges of perceived Gülenists that has been justified on this basis, there is a relative lack of hard, publicly–available evidence to prove that the Gülenists as an organisation were responsible for the coup attempt in Turkey. While there is evidence to indicate that some individual Gülenists were involved, it is mostly anecdotal or circumstantial, sometimes premised on information from confessions or informants, and is—so far—inconclusive in relation to the organisation as a whole or its leadership.

Why the Turkish government’s narrative was not found credible by the West

• The day after the coup attempt, the Turkish government began purging thousands of members of not just the military, but also the judiciary. Western observers noted that it would be impossible for the government to identify those responsible for the incident on such short notice.

• The lack of concrete evidence linking Gülen to the incident. The few testimonies extracted from officers who “confessed” their links to the Hizmet movement were not found credible because, ironically, pro-government media channels aired photos of those same officers showing clear signs of torture.

• Finally, Erdoğan’s own narrative is full of contradictions. Erdoğan claimed that he or his intelligence service knew nothing about the preparations for a military coup attempt up until the day of July 15. Western observers found it inconceivable that an event of this magnitude, which would require weeks if not months of preparation, could be orchestrated from another continent and not be discovered by Turkish Intelligence and a host of other intelligence agencies. Erdoğan claimed to have learned about the event not from his intelligence service, but from his brother-in-law. Yet, he did not dismiss the head of the intelligence service who, according to his own narrative, not only failed to detect the preparations for the incident, also failed to inform or protect the president after receiving a tip from an informant on the afternoon of July 15. Similarly, the chief of general staff was not dismissed despite failing to stop the incident after having learned about it several hours in advance.

Some observers also noted the following two reasons why Gülen organizing such an attempt would be implausible and irrational:

Starting in the early 1990s, Hizmet movement participants have set up schools, hospitals, medical clinics, and other civic institutions around the world. A coup attempt masterminded by Gülen, if successful, would send an alarming message to world leaders and spell the end of Hizmet around the world.

The top brass of the Turkish military consists mostly of Kemalists, or those sympathetic to the ideology of the founder of Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. There has never been a credible allegation that the top brass had any Gülen sympathizers. In fact, none of the top brass, including the chief of general staff, second chief, force commanders or army corps commanders has been accused of being a Gülen sympathizer. In an information age, it is impossible for lower level officers to stage a coup without the knowledge and approval of the top brass. If they did, there would be strong reaction from within the military itself. On the night of the coup, there was very little reaction from within the military itself.

Adding to suspicions about the government’s narrative was the Erdoğan government’s apparent unwillingness to fully investigate the incident. The parliamentary commission was delayed because the ruling AKP party delayed appointing members to the commission. Once formed, the commission, dominated by AKP members, refused to call key witnesses for testimony. Mithat Sancar, an opposition member of the commission, said the following:

The ruling AKP did not form this commission to illuminate the coup attempt. They constructed a coup narrative… They were expecting (this commission to produce) a work that would support this narrative.

Only information or rumors that support the government narrative have been allowed to be disseminated, and all other information has been censored by government authorities and a compliant media. Scores of lawyers have been arrested and attorney-client privilege has been revoked under a state of emergency, leaving accused individuals unable to defend themselves through due process.

Below we provide a narrative based on the information available from public sources and received in personal communications with the lawyers, relatives, or friends of individuals accused by the Turkish government. The author of this document is not in a position to claim that the following is what happened, but the alternative scenario provided here answers more questions than the government narrative, and therefore deserves to be considered as part of an independent investigation.

Possible narratives about July 15, 2016

The broad coalition

The prevalent view among Turkey observers in Europe and the U.S. is the following: A broad coalition of military officers, from different ideological backgrounds, had discussed an intervention against the Erdoğan government. They believed Erdoğan undermined Turkey’s democratic institutions and secularism. This coalition included but was not limited to officers who feared being purged at the August meeting of the Military Supreme Council. An informant alerted Turkish Intelligence of the plot on the afternoon of July 15, forcing some officers to start the action early. However, many officers gave up and refrained from participating, and hence the action of the remaining officers was doomed to failure.

Collusion

In another theory, a broad coalition of officers had been against the Erdoğan government. They had been discussing a potential military coup for months. Turkish intelligence and Erdoğan were aware of these discussions. An ultra-nationalist faction among the military associated with the Eurasian-oriented Homeland Party (Vatan) colluded with Erdoğan and the Turkish intelligence to stage a pre-emptive coup on July 15. The collusion narrative suggests that the incident on July 15 was a mobilization of a very small portion of the military, a weak and compromised action designed to fail.

According to this narrative, the attempted coup was, borrowing the language of a political commentator, “A genuine plan that was compromised and weakened, and allowed by President Erdoğan to play out in order to crush it and achieve his strategic goals.”

The so-called “Eurasianist clique” within the Turkish military[1] was described in a 2003 leaked cable by U.S. Embassy in Ankara as pursuing Eurasianism as an alternative to the U.S. “without understanding the Russia-dominated nature of the ‘Eurasia’ concept”. In 2003, the pro-U.S. and pro-NATO group called the “Atlanticists” were seen as losing influence within the Turkish General Staff.

What happened on July 15th does not exhibit the pattern of a coup planned by the military, but rather one planned by the intelligence service where military officers unwittingly played a crucial role. From their testimonies, these officers were mobilized under the pretense of participation in a regular exercise, educational exercise, “unconventional exercise,” operation to protect general staff headquarters, or protection of a military or civilian compound from a terrorist attack. It is also important to note here that there is not a single officer who states in his testimony that he acted by the directives of a civilian. This is worth noting, for the government narrative claims that officers associated with Gülen staged the coup with directives from civilians affiliated with Gülen.

Other indicators also substantiate the argument that the coup attempt was premediated to provoke public outrage and pave the way for Erdoğan’s autocracy. For instance, many civilian deaths happened not in the hands of soldiers, as Erdoğan’s media claimed, but by some paramilitaries connected to SADAT, a defense consulting company, which is becoming “Erdoğan’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.”[2] Erol Olçok and his son were killed on the night of the coup, and Olçok’s wife is telling, based on eye-witnesses, that they were killed by snipers.

Bombing of the Parliament has also left a lot of questions. The images of the parliament building show a much less damage than F16 figher bomb would leave behind; they are more like a C4 explosion from inside, not from above.

Contradictions in the Erdoğan camp

The statements by President Erdoğan and his allies, including Hakan Fidan, the director of National Intelligence Service (MIT) and the chief of general staff, include many contradictions and leave many important questions unanswered.

Although Erdoğan said he learned about the coup on the night of the coup from his brother-in-law, Hüseyin Gürler, a noncommissioned officer, says in his testimony that they informed the President on June 11, 2016.

Erdoğan’s refusal to fire, or even investigate, his intelligence chief and military chief despite their failure to inform or protect him remains a puzzle.

Erdoğan’s claim that he was first informed about the event by his brother-in-law around 9:30 pm and that he could not reach his intelligence chief were contradicted by Chief of General Staff Akar. In his written statement to the parliamentary investigation committee, Akar stated that Intelligence Chief Fidan called and spoke with the head of Erdoğan’s guard while in his presence before 8:30 pm. Hürriyet columnist Ertuğrul Özkök wrote on July 18, 2017, that Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said in an interview with Fikret Bila that he called Director Fidan at around 10:30 – 11 pm that night, and Mr. Fidan did not say anything to him nor to President Erdoğan about the coup attempt.

Erdoğan claimed that his airplane was assaulted by pro-coup fighter jets but protected by pro-government jets. The Greek Air Force refuted Erdoğan’s claims stating that no such air fight occurred.

On the afternoon of Friday, July 15, a captain referred to as O.K. informed MIT (National Intelligence Organization) headquarters that an attack on the headquarters was planned, with the goal of capturing MIT Chief Fidan. This officer was never identified publicly, ostensibly to protect him, and he was later discharged from the military, rather than given a medal of honor. He was later re-admitted to the military and given a position at MIT.

MIT Chief Fidan sent his deputy to the Office of General Staff at 4 pm and later met with the Military Chief Gen. Akar at 6 pm. According to the accounts of President Erdoğan and PM Yildirim, Fidan did not inform or protect the president or the prime minister. In fact, they claimed that they could not communicate with Fidan until 10 pm.

Fidan’s account of the events is full of puzzles and contradictions. According to Gen. Akar’s testimony, Fidan called Erdoğan’s guards and asked them if they were prepared for an attack, without specifying the nature or the scale of the attack and without asking to speak with President Erdoğan. Instead of staying with Gen. Akar to investigate and take precautions against a possible coup, Fidan left the general staff headquarters to attend pre-arranged meetings.

Gen. Umit Dundar, commander of the 1st army in Istanbul, pledged allegiance to Erdoğan during the early hours of the attempt, according to Berat Albayrak, Erdoğan’s son-in-law. It is unlikely that the military leadership would consider committing to a coup without the participation of the commander of the 1st army. It is possible, therefore that Dundar earlier gave the impression that he was in favor of a coup and misled some officers while intending to side with Erdoğan.

Military units in Istanbul closed access to the Bosphorus Bridge around 8 pm. It was later revealed that these units were under the impression that they were participating in an exercise. Gen. Dundar did nothing to stop the bridge closure despite the fact that the bridge lies in the area of the 1st army.

Gen. Hulusi Akar, Chief of General Staff, did not go along with the demands of the pro-coup officers. However, some of his actions raise questions. Could top level commanders hold meetings about a military coup without his knowledge and approval? Was he threatened by Erdoğan to play along with his plan? Why did he not protect himself or the general staff headquarters, or inform Erdoğan? Why did he not take more effective actions between 4 pm, when he was first informed by MIT Chief Fidan, and 9 pm, when he was reportedly taken hostage?

Gen. Akar was also criticized for not recalling force commanders, who were attending wedding ceremonies, to return to their headquarters and resume command of their forces. Despite the early information, these commanders did not take precautions to protect themselves and were later taken hostage. Their self-reported actions to try to stop the coup attempt were meager and raise many questions.

Gen. Akın Ozturk, the former commander of the Air Force, was charged with being the military leader of the coup by the government. However, the Office of the Chief of the General Staff issued a message describing him as a hero who tried to stop the pro-coup officers and prevent bloodshed. This message was later removed, but is available on other sites. He was charged nevertheless, then arrested and jailed.

Selahattin Demirtas, the co-chair of the HDP, the second largest opposition party, in a speech before the Turkish parliament, stated that Erdoğan knew about the coup attempt and foiled it before it started and his men added some dramatic elements (such as bombing the parliament) allowing Erdoğan to take full political advantage of the incident. Demirtas also claimed that many in the parliament were aware of this but afraid to speak publicly. Demirtas was arrested in February 2017 under terrorism charges.

Responses to the government’s “evidence” against Gülen

The Erdoğan government’s alleged “evidence” implicating Gülen and his sympathizers fails to convince.

The association of the three police officers who allegedly participated in the attempt alongside soldiers is questionable. These officers were not among the thousands of police officers purged by the Erdoğan government prior to July 15. In any case, if Erdoğan’s claims of Gülen having thousands of sympathizers within the police force is true, it doesn’t make sense that only three would participate in the attempt.

The confessions of affiliation with Gülen by officers like Levent Turkkan and General Sağır were taken under duress. These confessions are not reliable, as they later said they were tortured for those confessions.

Both Gülen and Gen. Hakan Evrim, who allegedly made the offer for Akar to speak with Gülen, denied this claim. Akar was not called to give testimony to the parliamentary commission about this and other allegations involving him. He did not address this issue in his written responses to the commission.

The government claimed that Adil Oksuz, who is a professor of Theology at Sakarya University, was the organizer of the air force officers affiliated with Gülen. Besides the fact that it is impossible to stage a military coup with the air force alone, this allegation has many problems. The government claimed that Adil Oksuz was arrested near the Akinci Air Base, the alleged headquarters of the attempt. According to an interview given by Adil Oksuz’s family, when he met with them before his disappearance, Oksuz claimed that he was brought to the base against his will after being detained at a police checkpoint. Despite the alleged presence of an intelligence service file on him, he was deliberately let free by two judges on July 16 and at a mandatory report at the courthouse on July 18. He then traveled on a commercial flight to Istanbul, going through airport security checkpoints with his own ID, and then disappeared after meeting his family. It appears that the government wanted Oksuz to disappear so that the claims against him and the alleged link to Gülen could be circulated without challenge.

Gülen acknowledged that around 30 years ago, when Oksuz was a student, he was part of a study circle within the movement. “Adil Oksuz, at one time, I think when he was studying at school, he became part of our study circle,” he replied.

But while he acknowledged the Turkish government’s account that Oksuz had visited the Golden Generation Retreat and Recreation Center before the July 2016 coup bid, Gulen dismissed allegations that the visit constituted the smoking gun in the coup investigation. “A few years ago, he [Oksuz] came here once. I later saw in the media this picture of his child with me. This is something hundreds of people do. From taking a picture to making that kind of connection would be jumping to conclusions.”

Strategic goals achieved by Erdoğan thanks to the coup attempt

The July 15th incident gave Erdoğan an excellent excuse to pursue his goal of consolidating his power.

• The morning after the coup attempt, a huge purge started, with over 2,700 members of the judiciary and over 120,000 government employees sacked, 8,000 military officers dismissed, including 150 NATO officers.

• None of the army or army corps commanders have been accused of being Gülen sympathizers. However, Gen. Adem Huduti, commander of the 2nd Army, was known as a Kemalist/secularist commander, and Gen. Erdal Ozturk, commander of the 3rd Army Corps, was also known as a Kemalist/secularist commander. Both were arrested. What these commanders had in common – along with Gen. Semih Terzi, commander of Special Forces’ 1st Brigade, who was killed by an inferior officer – was their strong opposition to the Turkish military’s incursion into Syria. Shortly following the coup attempt, in August 2016, the Turkish military began an operation in Syria.

• Erdoğan’s bid for an executive presidency gained momentum. In a constitutional referendum in April 2017, Erdoğan narrowly secured the path to his executive presidency.

Concluding remarks

On July 15, 2016, a horrific and an unprecedented incident happened in Turkey. It cost the lives of hundreds of soldiers and civilians, and was crushed primarily by the efforts of the police force and civilians. Many aspects of the incident baffled observers, and many unanswered questions remain. As shown in this article, the actions of many of the primary actors don’t make sense if the government’s narrative is to be accepted. However, if an alternative narrative is considered, these actions make sense and the questions are answered. Based on many indicators listed above one highly likely narrative suggests it was a trap from the very beginning; it was planned and directed by MIT and its affiliates in the army with an impression as if it was a collective action in the chain of command. Officers who had already been profiled as oppositional were called in – they only obeyed orders without realizing it was a trap.

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By: Yuksel A. Aslandogan. PHD/fountainmagazine

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Based on publicly available data, the coup indictments, testimonials in court trials, private interviews, reviews of military expert opinions and other evidence collected by researchers, SCF is fairly confident that this attempt did not even qualify a coup bid in any sense of military mobilization which was unusually limited in numbers, confined in few cities, poorly managed, defied the established practices, tradition, rules of engagement and standard operating procedures in Turkish military.

“This was a continuation of a series of false flags that were uncovered in the last couple of years under the authoritarian rule of Erdoğan regime and it was certainly the bloodiest one,” said Abdullah Bozkurt, the President of SCF.

“Erdoğan appears to have tapped on widely circulated coup rumors in Turkish capital and staged own show to steal wind and set up his opposition for a persecution,” he added.

Judging from the results of the coup bid, Erdoğan won big time by securing imperial presidency, consolidating his gains, stifle the opposition and even launching cross border military incursion into Syria for which he had been itching for too long. No wonder why he immediately called the attempt as “a gift from God.”

The report was originally published in Turkish. SCF plans to release an English edition soon with new changes and updated data.

Here are some of the findings from 191-page detailed report on what happened on July 15, 2016, and days leading to that.

• A huge gap has emerged between facts and the government’s narrative on coup bid despite intense efforts by Erdoğan regime’s in the form of censorship, propaganda, pressure, threats and even torture and ill-treatment. The testimonials from defendants and the evidence that was uncovered so far has further bolstered the view that the coup attempt was nothing but a set-up.
• The conflicting public accounts by Erdoğan regarding the chain of events on the day of the coup, his recollection that even differ from the indictments issued by judiciary that is tightly controlled by his regime, the anti-democratic measures taken in the aftermath of the July 15, the shuttering of thousands of institutions and the arrests of tens of thousands of civilians cast a long shadow on July 15 events.
• The fact that the head of Turkish intelligence service (MİT), Hakan Fidan, was tipped off about the coup in advance according to his own written statements sent to Parliament, but he neither informed the Prime Minister nor the President strengthened the claim that the coup bid was totally staged. There is no explanation for why the officials who are, first and foremost, responsible for discovering, thwarting, and halting the coup attempt against the elected government remained unreachable on the day of the coup and why they followed the daily routine even after they learned about the attempt.
• Against the background of intel chief Hakan Fidan’s lack of testimony either as a suspect or witness in any judicial investigation into the coup attempt, his no-show at the Parliamentary Coup Investigation Commission for a testimony, and the very fact that he kept his job, Erdoğan actually expects everybody to believe in his constructed narrative about the coup attempt without even questioning and investigating anything significant.
• The fact that intel head Hakan Fidan met with the top military officials for hours a day before the coup as well as on the coup day, his trip to the General Staff’s headquarters despite alleged tip-off that he was going to be whisked away and detained by military, his leaving the military headquarters without a hassle, and the launch of the coup attempt right after his departure has not been explained and justified as of today.
• It is also important to note the Chief of General Staff Hulusi Akar made conflicting statements. Testimonials by witnesses and defendants do not confirm the account provided by Akar. The military experts that SCF has consulted in preparing this report clearly underlined that the coup bid, tipped-off in advance, could have stopped easily in its tracks and prevented by simple and quick measures. Yet, Akar’s not resorting to such preventive measures fuels deep suspicions about July 15 events.
• It was highly unusual and odd for the top commanders of the military had gone on with their usual routine, even attending wedding ceremonies at hours when there was credible and alarming intelligence of a coup attempt was received. This is against the established traditions, practices and rules of the operating procedures in Turkish military.
• According to official account, 8,651 officers took part in the coup, corresponding to 1.5 percent of the total military personnel in the Turkish Army. Of those 1,761 were private conscripts, 1,214 were military students, and 5,761 were officers and non-commissioned officers. But even these numbers do not reflect the actual mobilization that was seen on the ground during the coup attempt. Given the fact that 168 generals and thousands of officers are now being tried on coup charges, the military experts find it odd that such an insignificant number of troops took part in the coup attempt. It is estimated that there are 200,00 troops under the command of these generals who are charged with the attempt.
• The strange events such as shutting down the Bosphorus bridge to the traffic one way, hitting targets that have not served to the goals of putschists at all, the sparing of politicians who should have been the primary target, killing civilians, trying to seize institutions by only a handful of troops were not explained. The limited mobilization of military assets was confined to few cities and the teams that are supposed to detain Erdoğan came to his hotel hours after his departure. All these makes-no-sense events appear to be suggesting that they were staged to give an impression and supply footages and photos for the coup.
• Even after one full year, Turkish government has failed to present a convincing and solid evidence that proves the Hizmet movement (popularly known as Gülen movement) was behind the coup attempt either as a mastermind or a participant. The fabricated and forced testimonials apparently taken under heavy torture in custody were later refuted by defendants when they appeared in court for trial hearings.
• As various researches that were published or reported by international institutions have revealed, officers who are charged of attempting the coup comes from various ideologies and backgrounds. In most cases, the troops were mobilized over threats of impending terror threats or as part of the military drill, defendants’ statements in the court has shown.
• Fethullah Gülen who has inspired the Hizmet movement that was accused of coup bid by Erdoğan, stated in an exclusive interview with SCF that the coup bid was “outrageous heinous scenario constructed by Erdoğan and his accomplices.” He said it was launched to pursue unprecedented witch hunt against the Hizmet movement. He made it clear if anyone who was sympathetic to the Hizmet movement took part in this heinous act, they betrayed the very ideals of the movement. Gülen reiterated his call for an international commission to thoroughly investigate the coup, an offer that Edoğan has failed to respond.
• The uncertainty behind the ballistic investigations on the weapons used in the murder of civilian and troops still lingers on. The paramilitary groups that took part in clashes, and that later appeared in various videos taken on coup night were not identified and how they were organized and mobilized remains a mystery. There were also reports that Turkish police distributed high-caliber weapons to civilians on the night of the coup.
• Turkey is no longer a country governed by the rule of law and democratic principles. It is now a state ruled by the government decrees under constant state of emergency. The judiciary is under full control of the government, freedom of press and expression are under hold, the parliamentary is no longer functioning and opposition politicians are behind bars.
• More than 150,000 government employees were dismissed from their positions on the basis of their critical views without an effective judicial and administrative probes. The purges in the military, judiciary, foreign service and security apparatus have reached to alarming levels. 51,889 people were put behind bars, without an evidence, a trial and conviction, mostly housewives, teachers, students, doctors, merchants, journalists who were affiliated with the Hizmet movement.

Click here for full report

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Source: stockholmcf.org

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Water cannon and police on horseback were used to disperse about 1,000 people outside the Turkish consulate.

The minister was trying to win support among expatriates for a referendum on expanding Turkish presidential powers.

The Dutch government says such rallies would stoke tensions days before the Netherlands’ general election.

Fatma Betul Sayan Kaya, Turkey’s family minister, had arrived by road on Saturday ahead of her planned rally.

But she was denied entry to the consulate in Rotterdam.

Ms Kaya was then taken to the German border by police, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte confirmed early on Sunday morning.

Earlier, the Netherlands had barred Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu from entering the country by plane. He has now travelled to Metz in northern France to address a rally there on Sunday.

In a Facebook post, Mr Rutte said attempts to find a “reasonable solution” to the countries’ differences had proved “impossible”, while dismissing Ms Kaya’s arrival in Rotterdam as “irresponsible”.

Ms Kaya said on Twitter: “The world must take a stance in the name of democracy against this fascist act! This behaviour against a female minister can never be accepted.”

Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Sunday that Turkey would respond in the “harshest ways” to this “unacceptable behaviour”.

Turkey’s Hurriyet newspaper later reported that Ms Kaya had flown from Cologne back to Istanbul.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had earlier denounced the Dutch government as “Nazi remnants and fascists” for denying the rallies.

The BBC’s Turkey correspondent, Mark Lowen, says that what began as a diplomatic row has turned into a full-blown bilateral crisis.

What is the row about?

Turkey is holding a referendum on 16 April on whether to turn from a parliamentary to a presidential republic, more akin to the United States.

If successful, it would give sweeping new powers to the president, allowing them to appoint ministers, prepare the budget, choose the majority of senior judges and enact certain laws by decree.

What’s more, the president alone would be able to announce a state of emergency and dismiss parliament.

In order to get it passed, Mr Erdogan needs the votes of citizens living within Turkey and abroad.

There are 5.5 million Turks living outside the country, with 1.4 million eligible voters in Germany alone – and the Yes campaign is keen to get them on side.

So a number of rallies have been planned for countries with large numbers of expat voters, including Germany, Austria and the Netherlands.

However, Mr Erdogan’s supporters have found themselves blocked from holding these rallies.

Why are countries trying to prevent the rallies?

Many of the countries have cited security concerns as the official reason.

Austrian Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz said Mr Erdogan was not welcome to hold rallies as this could increase friction and hinder integration.

Mr Rutte said the Netherlands asked Turkey to desist as they feared “compromised public order and security”.

The Dutch government is also facing a severe electoral challenge from the anti-Islam party of Geert Wilders in its election on Wednesday.

Many European nations have also expressed deep disquiet about Turkey’s response to the July coup attempt and the country’s perceived slide towards authoritarianism under President Erdogan.

Germany in particular has been critical of the mass arrests and purges that followed – with nearly 100,000 civil servants removed from their posts.

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Source: BBC

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