Members of Turkey’s armed forces said they had taken control of the country, but Turkish officials said the coup attempt had been repelled early Saturday morning in a night of violence that left at least 17 dead, according to state-run media.
Explosions, gunfire and a reported air battle between loyalist forces and coup supporters erupted in the capital throughout the night and Turks heeded the president’s call to take to the streets to show support for his embattled government.
The state-run Anadolu Agency reported a bomb hit the Turkish parliament in Ankara. CNN-Turk television reported some police officers and parliament workers were hurt in the bomb attack.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, in an interview over FaceTime with the CNN Turk station, dismissed the military action as “an attempt at an uprising by a minority within our armed forces.” His office declined to disclose his whereabouts, saying only that he was in a secure location.
The chaos capped a period of political turmoil in Turkey blamed on Mr. Erdogan’s increasingly authoritarian rule, which has included a government shake up, a crackdown on dissidents and opposition media and renewed conflict in the mainly Kurdish areas of the southeast.
The coup attempt began late Friday, with a statement from the military saying it had seized control “to reinstall the constitutional order, democracy, human rights and freedoms, to ensure that the rule of law once again reigns in the country, for the law and order to be reinstated.”
But the military did not appear unified, with top commanders taking to television to condemn the action and order troops back to their barracks.
“Those who are attempting a coup will not succeed. Our people should know that we will overcome this,” Gen. Zekai Aksakalli, the commander of the military special forces, told the private NTV television by telephone.
Fighter jets under the control of loyalist forces were flying over the capital to strike at helicopters flown by coup supporters, the state-run Anadolu news agency said. Private NTV television reported that one helicopter was shot down.
By Saturday morning, Nuh Yilmaz, a spokesman for Turkish National Intelligence told CNN Turk that the coup had been quashed, adding that small groups were still active.
During the fighting, 17 police officers were been killed in a helicopter attack on police special forces headquarters on the outskirts of Ankara, Anadolu said.
U.S. President Barack Obama said all parties in Turkey should support democratically-elected government, show restraint.
Mr. Erdogan has essentially been in power for 13 years now, but critics of his regime claim his Islamist leanings and increasingly heavy-handed approach to quashing dissent within Turkey has weakened his already tenuous hold on power.
In a surprising and unprompted statement, Turkey’s military leaders in April publicly dismissed rumors of a possible coup against Erdogan’s government.
The country’s internal political and internal strife have only been exacerbated by the ongoing Syrian civil war, and now the fight against the Islamic State, spilling across Turkey’s borders along with the increasingly powerful role Kurdish separatist groups are playing in the ISIS fight.
Former Pentagon official and senior security analyst with Washington D.C.-based American Enterprise Institute Michael Rubin suggested Erdogan’s “out of control” regime could prompt action by his opponents within the military.
“If the Turkish military were to act, the U.S. [would] back it up,” Mr. Rubin told The Washington Times at the time. “Erdogan has become such a liability that Washington would not lift a finger to see his restoration to power” in the same way the U.S. stood by when the Egyptian military removed then President Mohamed Morsi three years ago.
Turkey is a key U.S. ally in the fight against the Islamic State, providing a vital base for U.S. forces engaging with the terror group.
A U.S. defense official said ongoing government efforts to put down the coup have not affected U.S. operations at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey. The Pentagon is “monitoring the situation in Turkey closely and are taking appropriate steps to ensure the safety and security” of American military personnel on the ground in Turkey, the official said.
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, in Moscow for talks with Russian officials on Syria on Friday, told reporters he didn’t have details of the situation rapidly unfolding on the ground in Turkey and said it would be “inappropriate” to comment on developments. But, he expressed hope that the key ally and strategically important member of the coalition fighting the Islamic State would remain at peace.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and other Russian officials have called on their countrymen in Turkey to stay indoors amid uncertainty about whether a military coup is taking place.
A NATO official at alliance headquarters in Brussels told The Associated Press early Saturday that “we’re following events closely,” but said he had no other comment. The official spoke only on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to make public statements.
Earlier Friday night, Prime Minster Binali Yildirim confirmed the attempted coup, but did not provide details on the opposition elements within the military or the government’s ongoing response, during an interview with NTV television.
“We are focusing on the possibility of an attempted (coup),” he said, as Turkish fighters and attack helicopters circled government installations in Ankara.
Mr. Yildirim’s comments came shortly after reports on social media claimed Turkish forces had shuttered two bridges crossing the Bosphorous River, and that additional units were heading for the capital, Istanbul and other major cities in Turkey, in response to a reported “security threat.”
On Twitter, Turkish tanks were seen positioned around the Ataturk international airport and troops were pictured surrounding the headquarters of Erdogan’s Law and Justice Party.
Opposition leaders within the Turkish military ranks claim the coup was staged in an attempt to restore human rights and democracy to Turkey, according to Reuters.
Nothing in NATO’s founding 1949 Washington Treaty says anything about intervening in the internal or political affairs of an alliance member, and Turkey kept its NATO membership following past military coups.
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