6000 held in Turkey ‘cleanup’

Turkish authorities pressed on Sunday with a ruthless crackdown against suspects in the failed coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with 6,000 people detained as he vowed to stamp out the “virus” of the putschists. 

The death toll has risen to more than 290.
Justice Minister Bekir Bozdag said around 6,000 people had been detained in “cleanup operations” and warned that the number would rise.
They include senior army commanders, top judges, prosecutors and a military aide to Erdogan.
Earlier he told a crowd of thousands at a funeral for the victims in Istanbul there would be no let-up in the fight against his sworn enemy Fethullah Gulen, the US-based preacher he accuses of masterminding the coup plot.
“We will continue to clean the virus from all state bodies because this virus has spread. Unfortunately like a cancer, this virus has enveloped the state,” he said.
Egypt on Saturday blocked a United Nations Security Council resolution backed by the United States condemning the attempted coup d’etat, diplomats said.
The US, following consultations with officials from key NATO ally Turkey, had proposed a draft statement calling on “all parties in Turkey to respect the democratically elected government of Turkey.”
But Egypt, currently a non-permanent member of the Security Council, objected.
US Secretary of State John Kerry protest claims Washington had backed the coup.
State Department spokesman John Kirby said that Kerry had called Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. “He made clear that public insinuations or claims about any role by the US in the coup attempt are utterly false and harmful to our bilateral ties.” 
Meanwhile, Gulen said he had no involvement in the coup, and suggested it could have been staged by the president himself.
Gulen lives in Saylorsburg, a tiny town in the Pocono Mountains of the US state of Pennsylvania. “I don’t know who my followers are,” Gulen told The New York Times from his compound, when asked if any of his backers were involved in the coup.

Source: Arab News