Decisions reached at YAŞ (Supreme Military Council) approved by the President
Having met on July 27 in the aftermath of July 15 coup attempt, YAŞ (Supreme Military Council) met again today under the leadership of Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım. Marking the second meeting of the Council within a month, today’s YAŞ has become quite symbolic in the history of Republic in several aspects.
Held in Çankaya, Ankara at the Prime Ministerial Palace today, YAŞ meeting lasted for nearly 90 minutes, and, the decisions made at the meeting have been approved by President Erdoğan.
For the first time, the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Interior, Justice, as well as the Deputy Prime Ministers, attended the meeting. Again as a first, the number of civil officers was higher than the number of military officers in today’s meeting. While 10 civil members attended, there were only 4 military members.
A change in the structure of YAŞ was put in force with a decree passed under OHAL (state of emergency) with the attempt of giving more authority to the civil officers over the military.
In line with this new law, today’s meeting was attended by Deputy Prime Ministers Nurettin Canikli, Numan Kurtulmuş, Mehmet Şimşek, Tuğrul Türkeş, and Veysi Kaynak; Minister of Justice Bekir Bozdağ; Ministry of Foreign Affairs Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu; Minister of Interior Efkan Ala; Minister of National Defense Fikri Işık; Chief of General Staff Hulusi Akar; Land Forces Commander Salih Zeki Çolak; Naval Forces Commander Bülent Bostanoğlu; and Air Forces Commander Abidin Ünal, under the leadership of PM Binali Yıldırım.
The main objective of the meeting was to reach a decision on the extention of the duties of designated officers, while other points of discussion included the terms of office for certain military posts.
Decisions made during the Council have been reported as:
- Terms of a total of 434 colonels, consisting of 372 army officers, 27 naval officers, 35 air force officers, have been extended for 2 more years.
- 586 colonels have been dispatched for retirement.
- Terms of commissioned officers have been lowered to 28 years.