Turkey's Gul says no crisis as top generals quit
General Isik Kosaner
(Reuters) - President Abdullah Gul denied on Saturday that Turkey faced a crisis after the resignation of the country's four most senior military commanders, but acknowledged this had created an "extraordinary" situation.ISTANBUL |
The departure of the generals has caused turmoil in the military, giving Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan an opportunity to extend his authority over the once-dominant armed forces, the second biggest in NATO.
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Chief of General Staff General Isik Kosaner stepped down on Friday evening along with the army, navy and air force commanders in protest over the detention of 250 officers on charges of conspiring against Erdogan's government.
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In a farewell message to "brothers in arms," Kosaner said it was impossible to continue in his job as he could not defend the rights of men who had been detained as a consequence of a flawed judicial process.
Relations between the secularist military and Erdogan's socially conservative Justice and Development Party (AK) have been fraught since it first won power in 2002, due to mistrust of the AK's Islamist roots.
(Additional reporting by Daren Butler and Seda Sezer; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
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