CoE Head 'Understands' Turkey, but Urges Adherence to Rule of Law

Council of Europe (CoE) Secretary General Thorbjørn Jagland has called on Turkey to adopt judicial safeguards while responding to a failed coup attempt that rocked the country on July 15.

He has added Europe has shown "too little understanding" on the developments, referring to the alleged infiltration of coup plotters in the army, the judiciary and other structures.  

Jagland has met senior Turkish officials such as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım, and Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu.

"We see a need for a cleaning up of all of this," Jagland has noted, but has also urged Ankara to respond to the coup attempt "in conformity with [European] law and stardards of the European Convention of Human Rights and the case law of the Court of Human Rights," Hürriyet Daily News quotes him as saying.

Turkey is not implementing the European Convention of Human Rights as of the moment due to a state of emergency announced in July, days after the coup attempt.

The country's top diplomat for his part has asserted Turkey has never "made compromises on our understanding of democracy and will never do so."

He has also asserted his country acts in accordance with rule of law and with its international obligations while targeting the Gülen movement, which it blames for the coup attempt and to which it refers as FETÖ, or "Fethullah Terrorist Organization."