Two Turkish military attaches in Greece fled to Italy, others were caught overseas and several 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 Aug 11.These added to several other fleeing military attaches, high-ranking soldiers and diplomats who fled after the bloody July 15 attempt as operations in the country against the followers of U.S.-based preacher Fethullah Gülen were ongoing inside the country.
Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu told private broadcaster NTV that two military attaches in Greece - Naval Col. Halis Tunç and Col. İlhan Yaşıtlı - had fled by car and ferry to Italy with their families, but Turkish officials would seek their return.
The Greek foreign ministry said the two attaches fled before Ankara asked them to return to Turkey and before officials canceled their diplomatic passports.
“Greek officials have confirmed this. The brother of Col. Halis Tunç lives in the Netherlands. We are pondering the possibility that they might have escaped to the Netherlands,” said Çavuşoğlu.
Five employees of Turkey’s embassy in the Netherlands were recalled on suspicion of involvement with the Gülen 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.”
Daily Hürriyet cited military sources as saying the Turkish military attache in the Jordanian capital of Amman had also fled.
Çavuşoğlu 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 United Arab Emirates authorities and returned to Turkey.
Turkey has detained more than 35,000 people following coup attempt
| The latest numbers, for those keeping score. |
Just over half of those detained, or 17,740 people, have since been formally tossed in the calaboose
Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'!
, the official said. A further 11,597 people have been released while 5,685 remain in jug, the official said.
Outcry as Bulgaria Deports Gulen Supporter to Turkey
[AnNahar] Bulgaria's deportation to
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
of a supporter of U.S.-based preacher Fethullah Gulen
... a Turkish preacher living in Pennsylvania whom the current govt of Turkey considers responsible for all the ills afflicting Turkey and possibly the entire world...
, whom Ankara blames for last month's failed coup, sparked an outcry in the EU member state on Thursday.
Businessman Abdullah Buyuk, 43, was deported on Wednesday "as a person with invalid documents" after being refused political asylum, Interior Minister Rumyana Bachvarova told bTV television on Thursday. This sparked outrage in the news media and on social media, with critics charging that Sofia had bowed to Turkish pressure and had failed to follow proper legal or transparent procedures.
Buyuk arrived in Bulgaria in February -- long before the coup -- and
In March, two Bulgarian courts however refused to send him back, saying he was "sought for political reasons" and that they "lacked guarantees for a fair trial" in Turkey.
Prosecutors told AFP last week however that after the July 15 coup attempt, Turkey asked Bulgaria to reexamine the case. They replied that the request was "procedurally inadmissible."
But interior ministry deputy chief of staff Georgy Arabadzhiev told journalists on Thursday that Bulgaria had now received from Interpol "new worrying facts and circumstances" about Buyuk, without elaborating.