The Biden Administration issued a strong rebuke against a Turkish official who claimed in a media interview that the United States was behind a 2016 failed coup attempt against the regime of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
A February 4, 2020 statement by Ned Price, the State Department Spokesman, stated that “The United States had no involvement in the 2016 attempted coup in Turkey and promptly condemned it. Recent assertions to the contrary made by senior Turkish officials are wholly false.”
The unusually strong statement continued, calling the allegations against the United States “unfounded” and “irresponsible.”
“These remarks and other unfounded and irresponsible claims of U.S. responsibility for events in Turkey are inconsistent with Turkey’s status as a NATO Ally and strategic partner of the United States,” the statement concluded.
The statement was also shared by Price on Twitter, where he reiterated his position.
“To be clear: the U.S. had no involvement in the 2016 attempted coup in Turkey and promptly condemned it. Any assertions to the contrary are false and inconsistent with Turkey’s status as a NATO Ally and strategic partner of the United States,” Price Tweeted.
Turkey’s interior minister Suleyman Soylu accused the United States of being behind a 2016 failed coup that Ankara has blamed on a US-based Muslim preacher named Fethullah Gulen in an interview with Hurriyet.
More than 250 people were killed in the attempt to overthrow Erdogan and his government on July 15, 2016 when rogue soldiers commandeered warplanes, helicopters and tanks to seize state institutions.
Ankara has long blamed preacher Gulen, a former ally of Erdogan who lives in rural Pennsylvania, and launched a widespread crackdown on his network, which Ankara refers to by the acronym FETO.
Gulen has denied any involvement.
Soylu told Hurriyet that the United States had managed the coup attempt while Gulen’s network carried it out, adding “Europe was enthusiastic about it.”
“It is blatantly clear the United States is behind July 15. It was FETO who carried it out upon their orders,” he said.
Since the failed coup, the Turkish authorities have detained some 292,000 people over suspected links to Gulen and has suspended or sacked more than 150,000 civil servants, professors and academics.
Hundreds of media outlets were forced to close and dozens of opposition lawmakers were jailed, while the military was stripped of tens of thousands of soldiers and officers who were believed to be sympathetic to the Gulen movement.
