generalspeaking: Turkey’s Ruling Party, Opposition Unite to Condemn Egypt Coup

Thursday, July 04, 2013

Turkey’s Ruling Party, Opposition Unite to Condemn Egypt Coup

by Chana Ya'ar Turkey’s Gov't Factions Condemn Egypt Coup

-- Arutz Sheva 7, 4 July 2013

In a rare show of unity, both Turkey’s ruling AK Party and its opposition Republican People's Party have condemned Wednesday's overthrow of Egypt's President Mohamed Morsi following protests by millions that led to a military coup d'etat.

AKP spokesperson Huseyin Celik told reporters that the coup was a sign of "backwardness," and accused some Western nations of having supported the overthrow.

"Morsi deservedly won by his own efforts the elections organized by a bureaucracy inherited from [former President] Hosni Mubarak’s era and that took weeks to come to a conclusion," Celik said, according to the Turkish Hurriyet daily newspaper.

"This coup has also received foreign support," he charged. "Some Western countries have not accepted Muslim Brotherhood’s rise to power. They have mobilized the streets, then issued a memorandum, and are now staging the coup."

Turkey, he said, is concerned about the bloodshed that may now follow such a coup, having experienced similar overthrows in 1960 and 1980. "If Morsi’s supporters fight with his opponents, blood will be spilled. We will not approve that."

Turkey’s opposition, leadership, the Republican People’s Party (CHP), also criticized Egypt’s military over the coup. CHP leader Kemal Kililcdaroglu said flatly, "Military coups cannot be accepted. I hope democracy will be accepted soon.

"We see that people who assume that democracy consists only of the ballot box are mistaken," he said. "There is a concept called pluralism. The rulers of the state must listen to everybody’s demands. Being deaf or ignoring demands, saying ‘I have the majority of the votes, so I will do what I want,’ is no longer valid these days."

The opposition leader added that " Above all, staging a military coup to design societies is not a correct thing in the 21st century and it shouldn’t be accepted."

An Israeli official meanwhile has told the AFP news agency that the government is following Egyptian events closely, but that he currently cannot predict what path events will take next. He added that the situation in Egypt is sending "shockwaves" to the Arab world, and has raised some concern in Israel.

Tags: Turkey ,AK party ,CHP party ,Egypt June 30 revolution