Thursday, July 21, 2016

Speaking in Brussels on Monday, French foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault said: "It would be unbelievable if the death penalty was re-established in Turkey". He said Turkish reformists should ask themselves if they wanted progress to be "abruptly stopped" and that the EU would make "no concessions on values". German foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said: “Reintroduction of the death penalty would prevent successful negotiations to join the EU”.  Steffen Seibert, chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman, said in Berlin that Merkel had phoned Erdogan.  “A country that has the death penalty can't be a member of the European Union and the introduction of the death penalty in Turkey would therefore mean the end of accession negotiations”, he said.  Nato does not require its members not to execute people, but the defence alliance reinforced the EU’s appeals on Monday.   Its secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, also phoned the Turkish president. “Being part of a unique community of values, it is essential for Turkey, like all other allies, to ensure full respect for democracy and its institutions, the constitutional order, the rule of law and fundamental freedoms”, Stoltenberg said afterward. In a sign of the mood in Ankara, Egemen Bagis, Erdogan’s former EU affairs minister, said on social media: “Do you think Turks care about what EU states at this point? We are furious”. “EU should support Turkey not Feto”, he added, referring to Fethullah Gulen, an Islamic preacher who lives in the US and who was also accused of plotting Erdogan’s downfall.  Speaking in a statement on Monday, John Bass, the US ambassador to Turkey, said: "Unfortunately, some ... public figures have speculated that the United States in some way supported the coup attempt. This is categorically untrue, and such speculation is harmful to the decades-long friendship between two great nations".  He said that if Turkey submitted an extradition request for Gulen, then it would be "considered" by US courts.

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