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ERGENEKON LINKED TO MUMCU MURDER
Today's Zaman
Aug 5 2008
Turkey
Evidence included in an indictment on Ergenekon, a shady gang with
links to the media, business, military and bureaucracy which is being
accused of having incited a number of political murders and attacks,
suggests that journalist Ugur Mumcu was assassinated in 1993 because
he was trying to find out what happened to 100,000 firearms that
disappeared from the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK).
Cumhuriyet daily columnist Mumcu, a leading figure in investigative
journalism, was killed by a remote-controlled bomb placed under his
car on Jan. 24, 1993. He was long believed to have been assassinated
by Islamic extremists. Documents seized from Ergenekon suspect Veli
Kucuk's house that were included in the evidence section of the
Ergenekon indictment explain in detail that Mumcu was killed while
he was investigating how 100,000 firearms ended up in the hands of
men under Jalal Talabani, one of the Kurdish leaders of northern
Iraq. EÅ~_ref Bitlis, a senior general who was investigating the
same issue, died in a plane accident 25 days after Mumcu. Experts'
reports on the accident indicated that the incident was most likely
caused by sabotage.
The report found in the house of Kucuk -- a retired general who
is one of the prime suspects and possibly one of the leaders of
the Ergenekon organization - is now part of the nearly 2,500-page
Ergenekon indictment. Kucuk's document reads: "In January of 1991, an
interesting message was delivered from the [state weapons manufacturer]
Turkish Mechanical and Chemical Industry Corporation [MKEK] demanding
that the serial numbers of 100,000 firearms be erased in an operation
that would be conducted 'very secretly.' After the operation, which
lasted four nights, a senior ranking official who said, 'I am a JÄ°TEM
[a shady gendarmerie intelligence unit whose existence is denied by
officials] commander,' received the guns from me. One day before the
guns were brought to the Iraqi border on Jan. 15, 1991, forces under
the command of gendarmerie Col. CoÅ~_kun Kıvrak brought under siege
nearly 700 Kurdistan Workers' Party [PKK] supporters.
However, an order from Ankara at this point demanded the soldiers
be pulled back. The reason for this was the risk that an armed clash
could attract attention to the arms delivery. When Col. Kıvrak and
some other soldiers reviewed the order, which was also sent to MKEK
officials, they were shocked. In a later period, one of the soldiers
there that day photocopied the file and sent it to journalist Mumcu."
Mumcu's fatal mistake
In the same document, a chapter with the title "Ugur Mumcu's Mistake"
has a record of a number of phone calls Mumcu made to confirm the
validity of the document that had been sent to him. When the person
who sent the file to Mumcu found out about the phone calls he made,
he called him, saying: "The end of this is very shady. Do you want to
die?" and demanded that he forget about the file. On Jan. 23, Kıvrak
spent an entire day trying to get in contact with Mumcu. However,
he gave up after several attempts. He left a note with Mumcu's
secretary, which said: "It is a matter of life and death. You have to
see me." Mumcu never had the chance to see Kıvrak as he was killed the
next day by the car bomb planted under his automobile. His death came
exactly two years after the "very secret" message sent to the MKEK.
Gen. EÅ~_ref Bitlis was killed in connection with the same firearms,
the document suggests. In addition to Bitlis, gendarmerie Maj. Cem
Ersever was also allegedly killed for knowing about Ergenekon's gun
sales to armed Kurdish groups.
----------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------
Too many irregularities in records of Ergenekon-linked associations
Associations chaired by individuals detained during the Ergenekon
investigation have been inspected by auditors from the Interior
Ministry upon a request from Prosecutor Zekeriya Oz.
In most of the investigations, associations hid necessary documents
from inspectors, saying the documents were seized during the Ergenekon
operation and that inspectors should request them from the prosecutor's
office. However, further investigations revealed that the police have
not seized any documents that might be of interest to state auditors
and that the administrators have been trying to hide the documents
from auditors by making false statements. The audit reports on these
associations have been included in the indictment. These associations
include the Ayasofya Association, headed by Ergenekon suspect Sevgi
Erenerol; the Grand Attorneys Association, chaired by Ergenekon
suspect Kemal Kerincsiz; the Nationalist Forces Association and the
Nationalist Industrialists and Businessmen's Association (USÄ°AD).
Grand Attorneys Association Deputy Chairman Mehmet Demirlek did not
share any of his organization's records with the auditors, citing as
an excuse their chairman being in jail since January of this year. He
said a large number of documents have been seized during the detention
of Kerincsiz. However, a query from the Interior Ministry at the
prosecutor's office showed that none of the documents the auditors
wanted to see were seized during the investigation.
Irregularities revealed during the investigation include necessary
stamps lacking on the organizations' records, the first general
assembly meeting of the association was not done in full compliance
with legal procedures, people who are not members were elected to the
association's branches, and the year-end financial statement includes
false figures. Similar problems were found with the Kuvvacılar
Association, the Grand Force Union Association, the Private Security
Sector Businessmen's Union Association, the New National Forces
Movement Association, the Association of National Forces Warriors
and the New Protection of Rights Association.
------------------------------------ --------------------------------------------
Backg round: The Ergenekon indictment in a nutshell
The indictment made public last month claims the Ergenekon network is
behind a series of earth-shattering political assassinations over the
past two decades. The victims include a secularist journalist, Ugur
Mumcu, long believed to have been assassinated by Islamic extremists
in 1993; the head of a business conglomerate, Ozdemir Sabancı, who
was shot dead by militants of the extreme-left Revolutionary People's
Liberation Party/Front (DHKP/C) in his high-security office in 1996;
secularist academic Necip Hablemitoglu, who was also believed to have
been killed by Islamic extremists, in 2002; and a 2006 attack on the
Council of State that left a senior judge dead. Alparslan Arslan,
found guilty of the Council of State killing, said he attacked the
court in protest of an anti-headscarf ruling it had made. But the
indictment contains evidence that he was connected with Ergenekon
and that his family received large sums of money from unidentified
sources after the shooting.
The indictment also says Veli Kucuk, believed to be one of the leading
members of the network, had threatened Hrant Dink, a Turkish-Armenian
journalist slain by a teenager in 2007, before his murder -- a sign
that Ergenekon could be behind that murder as well.
The Ergenekon indictment accuses a total 86 suspects, 47 of whom
are currently in custody, of links with the gang. Suspects will begin
appearing in court as of Oct. 20 and will face accusations that include
"membership in an armed terrorist group," "attempting to destroy the
government," "inciting people to rebel against the Republic of Turkey"
and other similar crimes.
----------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------
Ergenekon evidence supports Ornek's coup diary claims
A controversial journal allegedly kept by former Adm. Ozden Ornek,
giving a detailed description of a number of generals' attempts to
stage a coup d'état against the Justice and Development Party (AK
Party) government in 2004, have not made their way into the indictment,
but documents found during raids on the homes and offices of Ergenekon
suspect Muzaffer Tekin, a retired captain, support the allegation
that the generals were indeed seeking to stage a coup.
A file found in Tekin's archive in which every single word of officers
serving as force commanders at the time has been meticulously noted
includes minutes from a two-day July 2003 meeting of a number of
generals. According to the minutes, the then chief of general staff,
Fleet Commander Ornek and Aegean Army Commander Gen. HurÅ~_it Tolon
(currently in custody as part of an investigation into Ergenekon, a
crime network), the commander of the War Academies and the commanders
of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd armies participated in the meeting. Notes from
the meeting and speeches made by the commanders establish the facts
noted in the journal allegedly belonging to Ozden. The journal was
made public when the March 29, 2007 issue of Nokta magazine published
lengthy excerpts from it, allegedly written by Adm. Ornek. According
to the journal, some former force commanders had planned two separate
coups under in 2003 and 2004.
------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------
Ergenekon officers promoted
Two officers whose names are included in the indictment of a criminal
network named Ergenekon were promoted during a Supreme Military Council
(YAÅ~^) meeting that concluded yesterday. The National Intelligence
Organization (MÄ°T) prepared a report on Ergenekon in 2002 that
included an organizational chart detailing the hierarchy within
Ergenekon. The report was submitted to the General Staff in July 2003
and then to the Prime Ministry in November 2003. Famous politicians
and journalists as well some members of the military were included in
the chart, a report released by Taraf daily last month showed. Officers
Ramazan Cem Gurdeniz and Serdar Okan Kırcicek were among the military
members in MÄ°T's Ergenekon report who were promoted. Others members
of the military mentioned in the report but not promoted include
Bekir Kalyoncu, Deniz Kutluk and Ali Feyyaz Ogutcu.
--Boundary_(ID_agqjBhM2k+00OBU5LVx2fQ)--
Today's Zaman
Aug 5 2008
Turkey
Evidence included in an indictment on Ergenekon, a shady gang with
links to the media, business, military and bureaucracy which is being
accused of having incited a number of political murders and attacks,
suggests that journalist Ugur Mumcu was assassinated in 1993 because
he was trying to find out what happened to 100,000 firearms that
disappeared from the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK).
Cumhuriyet daily columnist Mumcu, a leading figure in investigative
journalism, was killed by a remote-controlled bomb placed under his
car on Jan. 24, 1993. He was long believed to have been assassinated
by Islamic extremists. Documents seized from Ergenekon suspect Veli
Kucuk's house that were included in the evidence section of the
Ergenekon indictment explain in detail that Mumcu was killed while
he was investigating how 100,000 firearms ended up in the hands of
men under Jalal Talabani, one of the Kurdish leaders of northern
Iraq. EÅ~_ref Bitlis, a senior general who was investigating the
same issue, died in a plane accident 25 days after Mumcu. Experts'
reports on the accident indicated that the incident was most likely
caused by sabotage.
The report found in the house of Kucuk -- a retired general who
is one of the prime suspects and possibly one of the leaders of
the Ergenekon organization - is now part of the nearly 2,500-page
Ergenekon indictment. Kucuk's document reads: "In January of 1991, an
interesting message was delivered from the [state weapons manufacturer]
Turkish Mechanical and Chemical Industry Corporation [MKEK] demanding
that the serial numbers of 100,000 firearms be erased in an operation
that would be conducted 'very secretly.' After the operation, which
lasted four nights, a senior ranking official who said, 'I am a JÄ°TEM
[a shady gendarmerie intelligence unit whose existence is denied by
officials] commander,' received the guns from me. One day before the
guns were brought to the Iraqi border on Jan. 15, 1991, forces under
the command of gendarmerie Col. CoÅ~_kun Kıvrak brought under siege
nearly 700 Kurdistan Workers' Party [PKK] supporters.
However, an order from Ankara at this point demanded the soldiers
be pulled back. The reason for this was the risk that an armed clash
could attract attention to the arms delivery. When Col. Kıvrak and
some other soldiers reviewed the order, which was also sent to MKEK
officials, they were shocked. In a later period, one of the soldiers
there that day photocopied the file and sent it to journalist Mumcu."
Mumcu's fatal mistake
In the same document, a chapter with the title "Ugur Mumcu's Mistake"
has a record of a number of phone calls Mumcu made to confirm the
validity of the document that had been sent to him. When the person
who sent the file to Mumcu found out about the phone calls he made,
he called him, saying: "The end of this is very shady. Do you want to
die?" and demanded that he forget about the file. On Jan. 23, Kıvrak
spent an entire day trying to get in contact with Mumcu. However,
he gave up after several attempts. He left a note with Mumcu's
secretary, which said: "It is a matter of life and death. You have to
see me." Mumcu never had the chance to see Kıvrak as he was killed the
next day by the car bomb planted under his automobile. His death came
exactly two years after the "very secret" message sent to the MKEK.
Gen. EÅ~_ref Bitlis was killed in connection with the same firearms,
the document suggests. In addition to Bitlis, gendarmerie Maj. Cem
Ersever was also allegedly killed for knowing about Ergenekon's gun
sales to armed Kurdish groups.
----------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------
Too many irregularities in records of Ergenekon-linked associations
Associations chaired by individuals detained during the Ergenekon
investigation have been inspected by auditors from the Interior
Ministry upon a request from Prosecutor Zekeriya Oz.
In most of the investigations, associations hid necessary documents
from inspectors, saying the documents were seized during the Ergenekon
operation and that inspectors should request them from the prosecutor's
office. However, further investigations revealed that the police have
not seized any documents that might be of interest to state auditors
and that the administrators have been trying to hide the documents
from auditors by making false statements. The audit reports on these
associations have been included in the indictment. These associations
include the Ayasofya Association, headed by Ergenekon suspect Sevgi
Erenerol; the Grand Attorneys Association, chaired by Ergenekon
suspect Kemal Kerincsiz; the Nationalist Forces Association and the
Nationalist Industrialists and Businessmen's Association (USÄ°AD).
Grand Attorneys Association Deputy Chairman Mehmet Demirlek did not
share any of his organization's records with the auditors, citing as
an excuse their chairman being in jail since January of this year. He
said a large number of documents have been seized during the detention
of Kerincsiz. However, a query from the Interior Ministry at the
prosecutor's office showed that none of the documents the auditors
wanted to see were seized during the investigation.
Irregularities revealed during the investigation include necessary
stamps lacking on the organizations' records, the first general
assembly meeting of the association was not done in full compliance
with legal procedures, people who are not members were elected to the
association's branches, and the year-end financial statement includes
false figures. Similar problems were found with the Kuvvacılar
Association, the Grand Force Union Association, the Private Security
Sector Businessmen's Union Association, the New National Forces
Movement Association, the Association of National Forces Warriors
and the New Protection of Rights Association.
------------------------------------ --------------------------------------------
Backg round: The Ergenekon indictment in a nutshell
The indictment made public last month claims the Ergenekon network is
behind a series of earth-shattering political assassinations over the
past two decades. The victims include a secularist journalist, Ugur
Mumcu, long believed to have been assassinated by Islamic extremists
in 1993; the head of a business conglomerate, Ozdemir Sabancı, who
was shot dead by militants of the extreme-left Revolutionary People's
Liberation Party/Front (DHKP/C) in his high-security office in 1996;
secularist academic Necip Hablemitoglu, who was also believed to have
been killed by Islamic extremists, in 2002; and a 2006 attack on the
Council of State that left a senior judge dead. Alparslan Arslan,
found guilty of the Council of State killing, said he attacked the
court in protest of an anti-headscarf ruling it had made. But the
indictment contains evidence that he was connected with Ergenekon
and that his family received large sums of money from unidentified
sources after the shooting.
The indictment also says Veli Kucuk, believed to be one of the leading
members of the network, had threatened Hrant Dink, a Turkish-Armenian
journalist slain by a teenager in 2007, before his murder -- a sign
that Ergenekon could be behind that murder as well.
The Ergenekon indictment accuses a total 86 suspects, 47 of whom
are currently in custody, of links with the gang. Suspects will begin
appearing in court as of Oct. 20 and will face accusations that include
"membership in an armed terrorist group," "attempting to destroy the
government," "inciting people to rebel against the Republic of Turkey"
and other similar crimes.
----------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------
Ergenekon evidence supports Ornek's coup diary claims
A controversial journal allegedly kept by former Adm. Ozden Ornek,
giving a detailed description of a number of generals' attempts to
stage a coup d'état against the Justice and Development Party (AK
Party) government in 2004, have not made their way into the indictment,
but documents found during raids on the homes and offices of Ergenekon
suspect Muzaffer Tekin, a retired captain, support the allegation
that the generals were indeed seeking to stage a coup.
A file found in Tekin's archive in which every single word of officers
serving as force commanders at the time has been meticulously noted
includes minutes from a two-day July 2003 meeting of a number of
generals. According to the minutes, the then chief of general staff,
Fleet Commander Ornek and Aegean Army Commander Gen. HurÅ~_it Tolon
(currently in custody as part of an investigation into Ergenekon, a
crime network), the commander of the War Academies and the commanders
of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd armies participated in the meeting. Notes from
the meeting and speeches made by the commanders establish the facts
noted in the journal allegedly belonging to Ozden. The journal was
made public when the March 29, 2007 issue of Nokta magazine published
lengthy excerpts from it, allegedly written by Adm. Ornek. According
to the journal, some former force commanders had planned two separate
coups under in 2003 and 2004.
------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------
Ergenekon officers promoted
Two officers whose names are included in the indictment of a criminal
network named Ergenekon were promoted during a Supreme Military Council
(YAÅ~^) meeting that concluded yesterday. The National Intelligence
Organization (MÄ°T) prepared a report on Ergenekon in 2002 that
included an organizational chart detailing the hierarchy within
Ergenekon. The report was submitted to the General Staff in July 2003
and then to the Prime Ministry in November 2003. Famous politicians
and journalists as well some members of the military were included in
the chart, a report released by Taraf daily last month showed. Officers
Ramazan Cem Gurdeniz and Serdar Okan Kırcicek were among the military
members in MÄ°T's Ergenekon report who were promoted. Others members
of the military mentioned in the report but not promoted include
Bekir Kalyoncu, Deniz Kutluk and Ali Feyyaz Ogutcu.
--Boundary_(ID_agqjBhM2k+00OBU5LVx2fQ)--