Coup attempted in Turkey
17 dead, scores hurt as Turks take to streets to confront troops making power grab
Ankara, Turkey — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told the nation Saturday that his government was working to crush a coup attempt after a night of explosions, air battles and gunfire across the capital that left at least 17 dead and scores wounded.
Government officials said the coup appeared to have failed as Turks took to the streets overnight to confront troops attempting to take over the country. But the sounds of huge blasts continued in the capital, Ankara, and Istanbul throughout the morning, including a bomb that hit the parliament complex.
Speaking on national television from Istanbul, Erdogan said the government was arresting coup supporters in the military and “they will pay a heavy price for their treason to Turkey,” according to a transcript of his remarks provided by his office. “Those who stain the military’s reputation must leave. The process has started today and it will continue just as we fight other terrorist groups.”
Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, speaking to state-run Anadolu Agency, said more than 120 arrests were made.
Erdogan, who said his general secretary had been abducted by the coup plotters, flew into Istanbul’s Ataturk airport early Saturday and was greeted by large crowds. Hours earlier, as the coup attempt got under way, his office had declined to say where he was. He gave an interview over FaceTime to a television station.
The chaos capped a period of political turmoil in Turkey blamed on 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.
Turkey, a NATO member, is a key partner in U.S.-led efforts to defeat the Islamic State group, and has allowed American jets to use its Incirlik air base to fly missions against the extremists in nearby Syria and Iraq. A coup against the democratically elected government could make it difficult for the United States to continue to cooperate with Turkey.
U.S. President Barack Obama urged all sides in Turkey to support the democratically elected government. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said he spoke to Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu and called for respect for democracy.
Nice, France — France called up thousands of reserve security forces Friday as authorities tried to determine why a Tunisian deliveryman known only to be a petty criminal took the wheel of a 19-ton truck and plunged through a terrified seaside crowd on Bastille Day, leaving 84 people dead and more than 200 wounded.
Witnesses described how Mohamed Bouhlel barreled his truck in a zigzag path down a crowded Nice promenade, aiming directly for children, for mothers pushing strollers and for families cowering behind plastic benches.
President Francois Hollande extended a national state of emergency that stretched back to the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris that killed 130 people and was claimed by the Islamic State group.
The state of emergency had been due to be scaled back but instead was extended another three months. The government tapped its operational reserve of 25,000 — composed mainly of ex-military or former gendarmes — to relieve its tired officers, stretched by month after month of state-of-emergency policing.
Hollande said the attack was “undeniably terrorist in nature,” but prosecutors said the 31-year-old driver who lived in Nice wasn’t known to intelligence services.
No group claimed responsibility for Thursday night’s slaughter of tourists and locals packing the upscale seafront, where an estimated 30,000 had just watched a Bastille Day fireworks show.
They fanned out to enjoy nighttime street artists, arcade games and food stalls or strolls back to their hotels beside the gentle Mediterranean tide. Then Bouhlel drove his truck into the sidewalk and turned a celebration into a terrifying dash for survival.
Cyril Croisy said he saw the truck accelerate into the first crowds outside Nice’s landmark Negresso Hotel, aiming straight for a stand selling candy to children.
He said he tried to help the wounded, including a woman with catastrophic injuries.
“I was there when her heart stopped,” said Croisy, his eyes welling with tears as he spoke. The 40-yearold Parisian suffered a broken arm while fleeing the scene and jumping from the pedestrian promenade to the beach below.
Ten of the 84 dead were children. Of the 202 injured, 52 were critically hurt.
Among the dead were immigrants and tourists from many nations, including Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Germany, Russia, Ukraine, Switzerland and the United States. Two Scots were among the dozens listed as missing.
French prosecutor Francois Molins said Bouhlel had a loaded handgun, three replica weapons and an empty grenade in the truck, which he had rented three days earlier. Police considered him a petty criminal suspected since 2010 of various threats and acts of theft, vandalism and violent conduct, he said.
In March, he was convicted for a road-rage crime when he struck another motorist with a wooden pallet but received a suspended six-month sentence because it was his first proven offense.