Greece Arrests 8 Escaped Turkish Coup Plotters; 2,839 Soldiers Detained
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - Greece has arrested eight men aboard a Turkish military helicopter which landed in the northern city of Alexandroupolis at midday on Saturday, the country’s police ministry said.
The men have requested political asylum, it added.
Greek state television ERT said the men may have been involved in Turkey’s military uprising on Friday, Reuters reported.
A total of 2,839 members of Turkey’s military have been detained in connection with an attempted coup overnight, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Saturday, adding that those detained included ordinary soldiers and high-ranking officers.
Yildirim, in a news conference in the capital Ankara, said the situation was fully under control and that “our commanders” were in charge of the military.
He called on Turkish citizens to fill town and city squares with flags on Saturday evening and said parliament would meet at 1200 GMT to discuss the attempt.
Yildirim warned that any country that stands by the US-based dissient Fethullah Gulen will not be a friend of Turkey and will be considered at war with the NATO member.
The government said that followers of Gulen, who has been living in self-imposed exile in the United States for years, were behind the attempted coup by a faction of the military on Friday.
The government accuses Gulen of trying to build a “parallel structure” within the judiciary, education system, media and military as a way to overthrow the state, a charge the cleric denies.
