Interior Minister Mustafa Çiftçi visited the headquarters of the elite Special Operations Police in Ankara on Sunday, where he exchanged greetings of Qurban Bayram, or Eid al-Adha, with police officers.
The occasion was also a tribute to members of Special Operations slaughtered by military infiltrators of the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) during the July 15, 2016 coup attempt.
Speaking there, Çiftçi said the Special Operations Directorate has repeatedly demonstrated what sacrifice meant since its inception. “On the night of July 15, an act of betrayal by those who sold their souls beyond the ocean took place,” he said, referring to FETÖ’s leader Fetullah Gülen, who was residing on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, specifically in the United States, during the coup attempt.
“Those traitors aiming at our nation’s will bombed the Special Operations Directorate, whose members have always been loyal to God, their homeland, the nation and the state. That dark night, however, was illuminated by heroes who acted under the leadership of our president, by heroes who became a member of this haven of martyrs,” he said.
A total of 51 police officers were killed at the headquarters of Special Operations Police in Ankara’s Gölbaşı district when F-16 fighter jets commanded by putschists carried out two strikes on the building where police officers were mobilized to counter putschists attempting to take over the capital.
