'Many Turks believe US behind coup attempt': ex-EU minister

ISTANBUL

A Turkish scholar has said that many people in Turkey believe the United States is behind the July 15 coup attempt because the head of the parallel state Fetullah Gulen lives in the country despite repeated requests for his extradition by Turkish authorities.

In an article published Wednesday in the Daily Sabah, an English-language newspaper based in Turkey, university lecturer and former EU minister Beril Dedeoglu said that in the history of coups in Turkey, the U.S. has always taken the side of the coup plotters.

"Even Russian President Vladimir Putin insinuated that the U.S. must be involved in this attempt," Dedeoglu said. "As a result, almost everyone in Turkey now has doubts about the U.S."

Dedeoglu said that it was not hard to guess that there were some foreign implications in the coup attempt. She said Turkey has to ask who exactly in the U.S. was involved in the attempt if it is to be sure about a possible U.S. involvement.

"Even though there are circles that backed the coup attempt, they are perhaps outside the current administration. Maybe that is why the U.S. administration and the Turkish government should focus their efforts on finding out who the plotters' foreign supporters might be. Maybe they do not need to look very far, and just study what their allies were doing," Dedeoglu said.

"Moreover, people have not forgotten that the U.S. supports the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD)," she said, highlighting the U.S. and Turkey's differences in their respective Syria policies.

Dedeoglu said if the attempted coup had been successful, Turkey's economy, political structure and social fiber would be terribly damaged and that was why people poured into the streets and defended their regime, their country and their society.

"The most incredible part was perhaps the eagerness of the plotters to kill their own people."

"Even people who know this group well were surprised by the scale and violence of the event. Had it succeeded, who here and in the foreign world would benefit from it?" she asked.

Dedeoglu said the parallel state would have been happy and not have used its power to construct a democratic and secular state. She said that "if Erdogan had been killed and the governing party dismantled, then President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi in Egypt and President Bashar Assad in Syria would be pleased."

On the contrary, some other nations including Iran, Azerbaijan, Russia, Iraq and the Gulf states would question with concern what kind of Turkey would emerge after this coup.

"Greece and Bulgaria would be quite worried as well to have a Turkey ruled by the military because they know by experience what that means," Dedeoglu said.

The July 15 deadly coup attempt occurred when rogue elements in the Turkish military tried to overthrow the country's democratically elected government.

Turkey deems Gulen and his so-called parallel state responsible for the coup attempt, which martyred at least 246 people and injured more than 2,100 others, and calls for the preacher's extradition to Turkey to face trial.