Erdoğan ‘offers Kyrgyzstan support in fight against FETÖ’

ANKARA – Anadolu Agency

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on April 9 said Turkey would “help Kyrgyzstan in the fight against FETÖ,” referring to what the authorities call the Fetullahist Terrorist Organization (FETÖ), widely believed to be behind the July 2016 coup attempt.

“Turkey will continue its fight against FETÖ at home and abroad until the last FETÖ traitor is held to account before the law,” Erdoğan said at a joint press conference at the presidential complex in the capital Ankara alongside his visiting Kyrgyz counterpart Sooronbay Jeenbekov.

“We will be with him [Jeenbekov] in the fight against FETÖ with our respective departments,” he said, adding that FETÖ also posed “a great threat to Kyrgyzstan” and had “tried to derail Turkey-Kyrgyzstan relations.”

“I believe that President Jeenbekov will be much more vigorous against FETÖ and take the necessary measures promptly,” he added.

The movement of U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fetullah Gülen, an ally turned nemesis of the government, is widely believed to have orchestrated the July 2016 coup attempt, which left 250 people dead and nearly 2,200 injured.

Ankara also accuses the group of a long-running campaign to overthrow the state through the infiltration of Turkish institutions, particularly the military, the police and the judiciary.