“This will also have an impact on the power balances”
Aravot.am asked Turkish human rights defender Levent Şenesever to present the situation in Turkey.
“It seems that the government has taken the control in hands. For the moment, 41 police, 47 civilians and two soldiers loyal to the government, as well as over 100 soldiers attempted coup have been killed. There are over 1100 wounded. The Chief of General Staff was held in hostage and released recently. The most important centers of the attempted coup have been captured. Many high rank of army officers have been taken into custody”, he said.
Levent Şenesever considers that people who attempted the coup have obviously violated the human and democratic rights by blocking the roads, trying to prevent the freedom of information and overall by killing civilians just because of their non-violent resistance: “However, the mass civilian resistance to the coup from different political backgrounds has been victorious in the name of democracy. Such a civilian resistance to the coup attempt has been for the first time in the Turkish Republic’s history and this was one of the crucial turning point to defeat the coup attempt”.
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In his opinion if the coup would have been successful, this would not only be disastrous for AKP and Erdoğan, but also for all human rights defenders, democratic forces and overall for all vulnerable groups in Turkey: “However, this will also have an impact on the power balances. Erdoğan was seeking an alliance with the army against Kurds and rest of the political forces. This relationship will certainly change in either way, depends on how Erdoğan will assess the recent political balances. In addition, I believe that Erdoğan’s power will be enhanced. The civilian resistance to protect the existing regime will strengthen the Erdoğan’s political capacity. We do not know yet, if Erdoğan will change his relationship with the army in the future, but what’s clear is that nothing will be same as before”.
Ami CHICHAKYAN
