Turkey FM: Criticism of Crackdown Amounts to Backing the Coup

A broad and aggressive crackdown by the Erdogan government in the 72 hours since the failed Friday coup d’etat has targeted tens of thousands of people, with some 8,000 people detained and many thousands more fired or otherwise targeted as suspects. President Erdogan has even talked about bringing back the death penalty, insisting executions are what the public really wants.

Suggestions that this is all going more than a little too far won’t be tolerated either, according to Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, who warned today that any criticism of the purge is “unacceptable” and that critics will be treated as supporting the coup itself.

This was seen as a warning both domestically and internationally, with Turkey facing growing disquiet from allies like the US and European Union, particularly over the death penalty plans, and that they aren’t going to be warned away from their current course of action.

The Erdogan government was already heavily cracking down on any public show of dissent domestically before the coup, so treating critics of the post-coup crackdown as plotters and cracking down on them too is virtually par for the course.

Still, the comments from the foreign minister may be indicative that the crackdown isn’t even close to completed at this point. It’s showing no sign of slowing, but with some 20,000 already effected, it’s unclear how much further it can go.