Turkey protests after US Embassy likes tweet about ill nationalist party leader – World

Turkey protested on Sunday after the Twitter account of the US embassy liked a tweet saying that Turkey should be ready for a political kingdom without Devlet Bahceli, the leader of the nationalist party that recently fell ill.

The dispute comes at a time when relations between NATO allies are strained due to Turkey's threat of incursion into northeastern Syria, after Ankara accused Washington of stalling efforts to establish a & # 39 ; safe zone & # 39; there together.

Bahceli is the leader of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), which is an ally of the AK Party of President Tayyip Erdogan.

The two parties participated in parliamentary and presidential elections in an alliance last year, which allowed them to reach a majority in parliament together.

On Saturday, the US embassy liked a tweet that said Turkey should be ready for politics without Bahceli, which has had health problems in recent weeks.

The AK Party said on Twitter that the user who had published the message was searched for links to the Fethullah Gulen network, which Ankara said orchestrated the failed coup in July 2016.

Omer Celik, spokesman for the AK Party, said the State Department and the US Embassy needed to investigate the issue and that an apology would not be enough.

"It shows that some people employed at the Embassy are making a special effort to damage relations between the two countries," Celik said on Twitter.

"The United States Embassy must try to understand Turkey not through people linked to terrorist organizations but through people who can conduct a proper analysis," he said.

The Embassy posted an apology on Twitter late Saturday.

“Early today, our Embassy Twitter account liked an unrelated post by mistake. We are sorry for the mistake and we apologize for any confusion, ”he said. The same was also removed from the Embassy page.

Semih Yalcin, deputy director of the MHP, said on Twitter on Saturday night that Bahceli has recovered from his illness and will return to work next week.

Relations between NATO allies have been under pressure in recent years for a number of issues, including the purchase by Turkey of Russian S-400 missile defense systems, policy differences in Syria and the detention of the employees and citizens of the local US consulate in Turkey.