More than 110,000 civil servants have been arrested or sacked since the unsuccessful military coup over the summer summer, Reuters reported.

“And this is a very, very bad evolution that has come in Turkey since July, which we as the European Union simply cannot accept,” Jean Asselborn said in the radio interview on Monday.

Asselborn was speaking with Deutschlandfunk, a public broadcaster, which posted the interview online (in German).

The Turkish government has blamed Fethullah Gulen, a Muslim cleric based in the US, of orchestrating the plot. Those dismissed and detained are accused of being Gulen sympathists.

According to Asselborn, 60% of foreign investment into Turkey comes from the EU and 50% of Turkish exports go to the EU. “At a certain moment, we won’t have any choice but to apply this pressure [of economic sanctions] to counteract the unbearable human rights situation.”

Asselborn, of the LSAP, did not receive immediate support on his stance from Berlin. A spokesman for the German chancellor Angela Merkel said it was “important to keep the channels of communication open” with Ankara, said Reuters.

Turkey’s EU minister was quoted by the news agency as stating: “The Nazis are like apprentices when compared with Gulenist terror organisations.”

In September, Asselborn called for Hungary to be excluded from the EU over its treatment of refugees.