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Turkey issues arrest warrant for former CIA official Graham Fuller over coup attempt

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Toygun Atilla – ISTANBUL

The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office on Dec. 1 issued an arrest warrant for Graham Fuller, the former vice-chairman of the National Intelligence Council of the CIA, over his alleged involvement in the July 2016 coup attempt.

The arrest warrant alleges that Fuller was in Turkey during the coup attempt on July 15, 2016 and left the country after the failure of the attempted military takeover.

The warrant accuses Fuller of “attempting to overthrow the government of the Republic of Turkey and obstructing the duties of the Republic of Turkey,” ”obtaining state information that must be kept secret for political and military espionage purposes,” and “attempting to overthrow the constitutional order.”

It also states that Fuller was in contact with American academic Henri Barkey, who was also previously subject of an arrest warrant in Turkey, as well as other figures who played a role in the coup attempt.

Barkey is accused by prosecutors of organizing and coordinating the coup attempt in a meeting on Istanbul’s Büyükada island between July 15 and July 16, 2016.

Prosecutors claim that Fuller also participated in this meeting.

The arrest warrant comes after notorious Russian strategist Alexander Dugin had claimed during a recent TV broadcast in Turkey that both Barkey and Fuller attended the meeting on Büyükada. Dugin also stated that Russian intelligence agencies had “concrete evidence that CIA agents commanded the failed coup attempt.”

In 2006 Fuller wrote a letter supporting the U.S. green card application of Fethullah Gülen, who Turkey considers the coup’s mastermind.

Source: http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/turkey-issues-arrest-warrant-for-former-cia-official-graham-fuller-over-coup-attempt-123392

IS THE CIA ABOUT TO DUMP A KEY KURDISH ALLY? THE SPOOKS ARE SPOOKED

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Masrour Barzani, chancellor of the Kurdistan Regional Security Council, speaks at a press conference on the front line in the northern Iraqi city of Dohuk in the northwestern Kurdish province of Dohuk on December 18, 2014.
SAFIN HAMED/AFP/GETTY

BY ,

This article first appeared on the American Enterprise Institute site.

There’s a moral quandary at the core of Western human intelligence practices.

Should intelligence agencies dirty their hands by working with and perhaps even paying human rights abusers and those engaged in illicit activities?

Many human rights activists and progressives would say absolutely not, but the issue isn’t so cut-and-dry. While in an ideal world the CIA would not work with those with blood on their hands, often it is these very same people whom it is necessary to compromise to gain insight into decision-making and activities.

In one prominent example, the CIA partnered with a terrorist who had killed Americans in order to attain information which helped France capture Carlos the Jackal, one of the most notorious terrorists of the pre-9/11-era.

The important thing for intelligence operators is not to lose sight of the forest for the trees.

Manuel Noriega, for example, was a US intelligence asset as his military career developed and even when he became Panama’s dictator. But, as he grew increasingly erratic, the CIA cut him loose. Ultimately, he became a target rather than a partner.

The same is true of Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, an Afghan warlord and Mujahedin commander with whom the CIA worked briefly during Afghanistan’s fight against the Soviets — before concerns about his megalomania, sociopathic cruelty, and the blowback from these characteristics became too much even for Langley.

In Pakistan, too, the CIA has developed a love-hate, but increasingly hate-hate, relationship with its former contacts in Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence.

Now, it seems, the US intelligence community is beginning to have buyer’s remorse with regard to some of its key partners in Iraqi Kurdistan. The United States has long worked with Kurdistan Democratic Party leader Masud Barzani, who, alongside rival Jalal Talabani, controlled Iraqi Kurdistan.

Both men were nepotistic, and each appointed their sons to key administrative and security positions: Barzani placed his oldest son Masrour in charge of the security services and later installed him as chancellor of the Kurdistan Region Security Council, and Talabani placed his older son Bafil (Pavel) in charge of his party’s intelligence service.

Jalal Talabani, however, eventually forced his son into a London exile out of concern about his increasingly erratic and violent behavior. (Talabani nephew Lahur, however, continues to run a local anti-terrorism force).

Barzani, however, is far more a tribal leader and has been reticent to hold his children accountable for their actions. He has raised them to believe they are superior. He schooled them in their own private school where they learned, socialized, and interacted primarily with family members. Masrour Barzani’s erratic behavior is no secret.

Continue Reading on: http://www.newsweek.com/cia-about-dump-key-kurdish-ally-spooks-are-spooked-643406

US spent over $1 billion on CIA war in Syria: NYT, instate helping 45 million poverty-stricken Americans

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By Leith Fadel

BEIRUT, LEBANON (2:05 P.M.) – The U.S. spent over $1 billion since 2013 to have the C.I.A. train and arm the militants fighting the Syrian government forces, a new report by the New York Times (NYT) claimed.

“Critics in Congress had complained for years about the costs — more than $1 billion over the life of the program — and reports that some of the C.I.A.-supplied weapons had ended up in the hands of a rebel group tied to Al Qaeda further sapped political support for the program,” the report said.

This covert operation by the C.I.A. has proven to be one of the costliest and least successful in U.S. history, despite the fact it was also aided by Gulf allies like Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

“The shuttering of the C.I.A. program, one of the most expensive efforts to arm and train rebels since the agency’s program arming the mujahedeen in Afghanistan during the 1980s, has forced a reckoning over its successes and failures,” the NYT report added.

The operation has since been cancelled by U.S. President Donald Trump, causing outrage among Syrian opposition activists and rebels.

source: https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/us-spent-1-billion-cia-war-syria-nyt/

Assange: ‘Only 1 percent’ of the CIA material has been published

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(DW) WikiLeaks has sparked a debate about cybersecurity by publishing secret CIA documents. In a DW interview, its founder, Julian Assange, said he will publish more information – and he was critical of US tech companies.

There are no less than 16 different intelligence agencies in the United States. In 2017, they will cost US taxpayers some $70 billion (65 billion euros) – roughly twice Germany’s overall annual defense budget. The actual distribution of that sum among US intelligence services is classified, but revelations brought to light by Edward Snowden in 2013 suggest that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) receives the lion’s share. In 2013, that sum was around $15 billion. Now the CIA, a highly funded agency tasked with gleaning state secrets from other countries, has a problem keeping its own secrets: On March 7, the whistleblower platform WikiLeaks began publishing CIA documents under the name “Vault 7.”

The platform published 9,000 documents exposing the CIA’s secret hacking tools, many developed by a team of hackers at the US consulate in Frankfurt and used throughout Europe. In a DW interview, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said that the German government has yet to react to the revelations – apart from a statement issued by the attorney general that he would examine whether German law had been violated. Assange says that the lack of a serious reaction “sadly reveals the relative weakness of the German government when dealing with the United States.”

The CIA has lost control of its cyberweapons

In speaking with DW, Assange announced that more CIA documents would be published over the coming months: “We have only published one percent of the material; 99 percent of the material is still to go.” Assange criticizes the fact that the CIA has developed its own version of the National Security Agency (NSA), which is itself specialized in electronic espionage.

“[The CIA] became a giant hacker spy agency,” he said. “This hacker CIA then stockpiled an enormous quantity of cyberweapons – hundreds of millions of lines of code, more than all of Facebook, in cyberweapons. And then it lost control of all of them.”

According to WikiLeaks, the published material comes from an isolated and highly protected network within the “CIA Center for Cyber Intelligence” at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia – one not connected to the internet. Assange explains that cyberweapons pose a particular proliferation risk as they are only made up of information – so-called code. This makes the possession of cyberattack tools especially dangerous, most notably when those who possess them cannot guarantee that they will remain secure. That appears to be the case now, as seen in the Vault 7 publication.

Massive procurement of zero-day malware

The published documents also show that the CIA purchased massive amounts of information from hackers pertaining to the so-called zero-day vulnerability of software and electronic devices. This information was then developed into malware to exploit such vulnerabilities: allowing cellphones, computers and even televisions to be turned into remote spying tools. This malware allows the remote and undetected operation of cameras and microphones. It also allows remote users to read text messages and e-mails directly from screens before they are sent, for example, as encrypted WhatsApp messages. A recent photo of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg showed that it isn’t just paranoid crazies that take the threat seriously: the picture featured Zuckerberg at his laptop, the microphone and camera of which were covered with tape.

US tech firms working with the government

Companies whose products may be compromised by the CIA’s tools were informed about those vulnerabilities by WikiLeaks, Assange told DW. European firms reacted quickly. US tech companies, however, were more reserved – with the exception of the browser provider Mozilla. Other companies affected by the CIA’s hacking tools, such as Google, Microsoft and Apple, in contrast, simply forwarded WikiLeaks’ offer to provide further information to their legal departments.

Assange claims that this was done because these companies work with US intelligence agencies. It is also the reason that so many employees at such companies have US government security clearance, especially those who work in cybersecurity departments. But security clearance rules stipulate that if a person is given clearance, they are not allowed to accept leaked information. Assange’s critical summary: “[These companies’] entanglement, their proximity to the US government, means that so far, they are not able to properly secure their users from attacks conducted from the CIA or the NSA.”

Assange’s assessment is rather similar to that of Finnish cybersecurity expert Mikko Hypponen. In his keynote address at the computer fair CeBit in Hanover on Wednesday, Hypponen warned that the world was witnessing the start of a new arms race that would be fought out in cyberspace. The Finn was also clear about who is currently leading the race: the US. “No other country has invested so much in cyber capability for so long as has the US.” The security expert said that Israel was in second place, followed by Russia and China. Hypponen also had a clear answer to the question of just what makes cyberweapons so attractive: they are effective, cheap – and they allow attackers to deny their actions.

Trump new CIA Director Mike Pompeo’s recent visit to Turkey

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Erdogan-to-Trump-terroristPompeo’s visit was decided during a 45-minute telephone conversation between Presidents Donald Trump and Recep Tayyip Erdogan late Tuesday, according to officials from Erdogan’s office. They briefed a group of journalists Wednesday on condition of anonymity in line with government regulations.

The officials said Pompeo would also discuss the issue of U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish fighters, who the Turkish government considers to be terrorists because of their affiliation with outlawed Kurdish rebels in Turkey.

It was not surprising to see Turkish pro-government newspapers stressing that Ankara had delivered a warning that the U.S. should stop its cooperation with – or at least to limit the involvement of – the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in the upcoming Raqqa offensive. But amid the standard coverage of the CIA chief’s first visit to Turkey, it is worth noting that some columnists were sticking to their conspiracy-minded rhetoric ongoing since the July 2016 coup attempt, openly putting the CIA at the center of alleged support for the movement of U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen.

As expected, new CIA Director Mike Pompeo’s recent visit has made the headlines of the Turkish press. Pompeo is not only the head of world’s most famous spy agency, but he is also a perfect example of U.S. President Donald Trump’s favorite kind of operator.

The extradition of Gülen was possibly one of the discussion topics between Pompeo and his Turkish counterparts. In this context, one lawmaker from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) was quoted in the pro-government press as saying that Washington would never extradite Gülen but kill him and make it look like a suicide.

Trump CIA Pompeo honors Saudi Crown Prince for efforts against terrorism

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cia-honors-saudi-crow

The medal, named after George Tenet, was handed to him by CIA Director Micheal Pompeo after the Crown Prince received him in Riyadh. (SPA)

The Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior, received a medal on Friday from the CIA for his distinct intelligence-related counter-terrorism work and his contributions to ensure international peace and security.

The medal, named after George Tenet, was handed to him by CIA Director Micheal Pompeo after the Crown Prince received him in Riyadh on Friday in the presence of Deputy Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman al-Saud, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Defense.

The Crown Prince said in a press statement after receiving the medal that he appreciated the CIA honor, stressing that his efforts were guided by the leaders of Saudi Arabia headed by King Salman bin Abdulaziz al-Saud, as well as the efforts of the Kingdom’s security forces.

With regards to terrorism in the region, the Crown Prince said all religions are separate from the beliefs and actions of extremist groups, noting that religious, political and social groups who have used religion as a tool throughout history do not reflect the absolute truths about the religion which it is affiliated to, or attributes its actions to.

He said Saudi Arabia has played a key role in the fight against terrorism and condemns all forms and manifestations of terrorism. “We, God willing, continue to confront terrorism and extremism everywhere, and with thanks to God we have managed to thwart many terrorist plots from occurring,” he said.

The Crown Prince also stressed that the fight against terrorism is a shared international responsibility that requires international efforts at all levels to confront it militarily and intellectually, as well as financially. This must be done within the framework of international law and the principles of the United Nations.

With regards to the relations between Saudi Arabia and the US, the Crown Prince said: “Our relationship with the United States is historical and will continue to succeed.”

Addressing the issue of possible future attacks, the Crown Prince said: “We are surrounded by areas of conflict, and we were the first affected by terrorism from various sources, but we are equipped to combat terror in any place and under any circumstances.”

During his meeting with Pompeo, Prince Mohammed bin Nayef discussed a number of topics of common interest between the two countries and ways of enhancing them, particularly with regard to strengthening cooperation in security, especially the fight against terrorism.

The reception was attended by senior, civil and military, officials and the US Charge d’Affaires to the Kingdom Christopher Hensel.

source: http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/gulf/2017/02/10/CIA-awards-Saudi-Crown-Prince-for-efforts-against-terrorism-.html

Fidel Castro A revolutionary the CIA couldn’t kill: How survived ‘638 assassination attempts’ as Cuba’s leader,

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Wealthy farmer's son whose politics were shaped at university

Wealthy farmer’s son whose politics were shaped at university

Look back at life of man who led Cuba for decades and was a key player in a crisis which almost led to nuclear war between the Soviet Union and America.

By,

The Communist revolutionary Fidel Castro has died at the age of 90, it was confirmed today.

Castro led Cuba for decades and transformed the country into one-party socialist state.

He courted controversy throughout his reign, with the United States becoming increasingly alarmed in the early 1960s with his friendly relations with the Soviet Union.

Castro became a central figure in one of the defining moments of the Cold War by allowing the Soviets to place nuclear weapons on Cuba.

It sparked the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 leading to fears of all-out nuclear war between the Soviet Union and the US.

The CIA reportedly attempted to assassinate Castro on an incredible 638 occasions.

Here, Mirror Online looks back at his life and how he survived numerous attempts on his life.

Wealthy farmer’s son whose politics were shaped at university

Castro was born in 1926, the son of a wealthy farmer.

His left-wing politics were developed during his time studying law at the University of Havana.

He then become a revolutionary, plotting rebellions against right-wing governments.

Along with his brother Raul Castro and Che Guevara, he formed the revolutionary group the 26th of July Movement.

evolutionary becomes young leader of Cuba

Castro became Cuba’s Prime Minister in 1959 after playing a key role in the Cuban Revolution to overthrow Cuban President Fulgencio Batista.

He then transformed the country into a one-party socialist state under Community Party rule.

This led to concern in the US, deeply suspicious of communism, not least when Castro started getting close to the Soviet Union.

Among the reforms Castro introduced in the country included expanding healthcare and education.

But he also suppressed criticism of the regime within Cuba and introduced state control of the Press.

How Castro almost caused nuclear war between US and Soviet Union

With the US increasingly concerned with Castro’s relationship with the Soviet Union, it attempted to remove him from power.

This included assassination attempts, economic blockades and counter revolution including the Bay of Pigs invasion.

This resulted in Castro forming an even closer relationship with the Soviets.

Turkey Says FBI and CIA Behind Failed Coup, Gulen ‘Only a Pawn’

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Turkish PMThe Erdogan regime continues to play with fire renewing accusations that the United States spearheaded a complex conspiracy to overthrow the Turkish government.

A Turkish prosecutor claims that the CIA and FBI provided training to followers of US-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Ankara initially called the “mastermind” of the failed attempt to overthrow the Erdogan regime on July 15 that left hundreds dead and thousands more wounded.

An indictment, prepared by the Edirne Public Prosecutor’s office and submitted to the local Second Heavy Penal Court, seeks the harshest possible punishment for 43 suspected coup plotters. In the indictment, the prosecutors allege that members of “the Fethullah Terrorist Organization” (FETO) were trained by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

“The CIA and FBI provided training in several subjects to the cadre raised in the culture centers belonging to the Gulen movement,” read the indictment. “The operations carried out by prosecutors and security officials during the Dec. 17 process can be taken as a good example of this.” The “Dec. 17 process” refers to a high profile corruption probe that targeted senior government officials in 2013.

“The [failed coup] attempt aimed to weaken the state with all its institutions by getting rid of the government completely,” stated the document. “Those in the Gulen movement who work in the judicial and security institutions and who received the aforementioned training, took on the task and moved into action.”

The prosecutor’s claims were alluded to in part by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan who said Friday in response to criticism by US CENTCOM Commander four-star General Joseph Votel, “My people know who is behind this scheme… they know who the superior intelligence behind it is, and with these statements [condemning the post-coup purge] you are revealing yourselves, you are giving yourselves away.” The statement was interpreted as an accusation against US intelligence agencies.

On Saturday, the Turkish President continued the theme of subtle accusations calling US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen “a pawn” backed by a “mastermind” which has also been interpreted as suggesting that the US agencies supported the failed putsch.

US military and intelligence officials have been the target of scorn and accusation from Turkish leaders in the wake of the failed coup starting with the country’s Labor Minister who said on July 16 in an interview with HaberTurk that “the United States is behind the coup.”

These accusations were forcefully denounced by the State Department which called the claims “utterly false and harmful to our bilateral relations.” However, on July 17, Turkey’s Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said the country was ready to go to war with “any” country that backed Fethullah Gulen, viewed as a reference to America’s refusal to extradite the suspected coup leader.

These accusations have grown in recent weeks with Erdogan alleging that CENTCOM commander General Joseph Votel was siding with the coup plotters and with the country’s leading pro-Erdogan Islamist newspaper Yeni Safak printing a picture of American three-star General and commander of NATO’s International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF) John F. Campbell under the headline “The Man Behind the Failed Coup in Turkey.”

The result of the shocking allegations has been an emboldening of anti-American fervor in the country with over 5,000 protesters marching towards the Incirlik Air Base on Thursday chanting “death to the US” and demanding that the United States leave. That incident came on the heels of a massive fire near NATO’s Izmir base with officials suggesting the cause was “anti-American sabotage” as reported by Turkey’s T24 News.

On Saturday, 7000 armed police officers supported by heavy vehicles blocked all access to NATO’s Incirlik Air Base. Turkish newspaper Hurriyet reported that Adana Police received a tip of a brewing second coup attempt, but the country’s European Affairs Minister Omer Celik downplayed the sudden show of force calling it a “general security check” and asserting that “nothing is wrong.”

During the temporary blockade of the Incirlik Air Base, a group of several hundred anti-American protesters assembled near the scene chanting for the base to be shut down as confirmed by video accounts on the scene although some Western outlets have provided conflicting reports that the protesters preceded the blockade and that Turkish police were there to disperse the crowd.

Source: http://sputniknews.com/middleeast/20160731/1043813275/erdogan-turkey-purge-gulen-coup.html

Revelations How the CIA debunked Erdogan?

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arton122155-473x254The article below, translated from the Turkish by the MAFF, published February 28, 2014 in Time Turk, is a summary of an interview given by Sibel Edmonds Boling Frog Post January 18, 2014, under the title “The rapid transformation an imperial puppet “(see link at bottom of page).

Since then, the interview was reproduced and commented almost a hundred times in many languages ​​until December 2015.

Here is an outline

By Sibel EDMONDS

I have long lived in Turkey and closely followed the internal politics of that country. In reality, the purpose of my lawsuit, as a member of the FBI, was of leaking secret negotiations between Turkey and the United States. That got me to be persona non grata in the United States in Turkey. At the time, Erdogan was considered an angel by the US and then suddenly he became enemy because of its current policy. The CIA creates the world of puppet governments and overnight made them disappear. Erdogan he would suffer the same fate? The most blatant example is that of Saddam Hussein, initially there were congratulations between Donald Rumsfeld and Saddam, then the occupation of the country and the removal of Saddam. The same process is it not also booked Erdogan? The story begins with the draft Fethullah Gülen.

In 1997, the CIA relied on Gülen who wanted to establish Canon Law of Islam (Şeriyat) in Turkey, however, it was the reason he was prosecuted in his country. The CIA offered to settle in America and, for 15 years, it lives in the United States. It controls a financial network of 20-25 billion. Nobody is aware of the source of these funds.

Gülen has built outside the United States schools, madrasas (Islamic schools) and other institutions in various countries. The governments of these countries considering them as a threat to their sovereignty and their institutions closed all schools of Gülen.

Gülen and the CIA have created networks in Turkey in police spheres, justice, army and media. It is through these measures that Erdogan shone and been in power. In fact, in 1997 on the intervention of the CIA, the AK Party was banned and Erdogan imprisoned. In 2002, the army backed down and allowed Erdogan to become prime minister. So what has he spent between 1997-2002? Gülen was already in the United States.

Erdogan had gained popularity and claimed he never would bend before the imam, the people loved him. “The imam or not it will not prevent me from achieving a sovereign manner all my projects,” he said. What was the reason for this personal confidence? Its very tough attitude toward Israel? In the US, Gülen enjoyed great support of the Jewish lobby.

This is the second phase battle between Erdogan and Gulen on support of the Jewish lobby. Erdogan’s attacks against Israel were not much appreciated by Gülen. The bell had rung of separation. Immediately after, it was the case of Syria that arises. Turkey and the AKP government supported the opponents of the Syrian regime, which they were arming via the United States. Until then, everything went according to the plans for the overthrow of Assad. An unexpected event occurred, it was the Russian intervention which forced the United States to review its foreign policy in this region.

In Turkey, on the one hand the people had good relations with Syria and Assad, on the other hand Syria is a neighboring Islamic country of Turkey.

With the withdrawal of the United States, Erdogan left alone and deprived of American support. The CIA and Gülen had resumed their activities in Turkey. Erdogan quickly understood that these maneuvers were around Gezi Park. We must not forget that the manifestation of Gezi Park was originated by popular action. The Western press began to treat Erdogan of “Dictator”. His relationship with Al Qaeda were revealed.

Expected by the CIA of Turkey? The CIA project was to keep the country under its control, control policy. Thus they were able to hold Erdogan to head the government.

The CIA plan was to use Turkey as a model to influence other Muslim states of Central Asia. Erdogan and Gulen were considered the promoters of the CIA action plan.

The CIA lost a puppet state (Erdogan) that was beyond his control.

Erdogan to demonstrate its non-submission to CIA requirements stated: “The arms purchases that represent billions of dollars I will not do them either with you or with the United States, I will make with China. “

It was a serious error of his vis-à-vis part of the United States and NATO. This attitude irritated the members of the American Armament Industries and NATO.

The integration of Turkey into the EU dragged on, Erdogan asked the integration into the Shanghai Union. This attitude was his last threat, and was considered a vis-à-vis insurrection of his bosses. This means the end of your existence.

Therefore, the United States had to demonstrate the severity of the punishments they could inflict on other states. It was submitted to Erdogan possibilities. The first obligation: You shall reverse, you will improve your relations with Israel, you will give up your desire to purchase weapons to China and your membership in the Shanghai Group.

The second obligation: You’re going to resign and go quietly, because we have prepared your replacement (Ç.N: CHP); stolen and hoarded money, you can take it with you, we will allow you to go in the UK.

The third requirement is two scenarios: First, you disappear like Gaddafi and Saddam, we’ll find you on Taksim Gezi Park to. Second, you can go like Mubarak, we will keep you in a prison in the UK where you will stay for the rest of your life.

So Erdogan in front of those choices. The same had been offered to Gaddafi, Saddam and Mubarak. The CIA works that way. In a few months we will see the end of this story, because this situation can not last longer.

Daughter of an Azerbaijani doctor, Sibel Edmonds was born in 1970 in Iran. After a few years she went to Turkey before settling in the United States to continue his studies. During his collaboration with the FBI, she discovered and denounced acts of espionage and of withholding information that could endanger national security of the United States. After warning his superiors, she was silenced by the FBI and in her stubbornness, dismissed in March 2002. The legal proceedings instituted ultimately leads to the use of the state secrets privilege by the Attorney General of the United States John Ashcroft; Congress was even prevented from proceedings and deliberations of the case. She graduated in March 2006 PEN / Newman’s Own First Amendment Award (price of an association of writers) for his contribution to the simple freedom of expression which every American citizen has from birth.

Turkey Pays Former CIA Director & Lobbyists To Misrepresent Attacks on Kurds & ISIS

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BY HARUT SASSOUNIAN

harut-sassounian-small2Thousands of articles have been published worldwide in the recent weeks exposing Turkey’s strategic trickery — using the pretext of fighting ISIS to carry out a genocidal bombing campaign against the Kurds who have courageously countered ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

The Wall Street Journal reported on August 12 that a senior US military official accused Turkey of deceiving the American government by allowing its use of Incirlik airbase to attack ISIS, as a cover for President Erdogan’s war on Kurdish fighters (PKK) in northern Iraq. So far, Turkey has carried out 300 air strikes against the PKK, and only three against ISIS! Erdogan’s intent in punishing the Kurds is to gain the sympathy of Turkish voters in the next parliamentary elections, enabling his party to win an outright majority and establish an autocratic presidential theocracy.

To conceal its deception and mislead the American public, within days of starting its war on the Kurds, Ankara hired Squire Patton Boggs for $32,000 a month, as a subcontractor to the powerful lobbying firm, the Gephardt Group. Squire Patton Boggs includes former Senators Trent Lott and John Breaux, and retired White House official Robert Kapla. The Gephardt lobbying team for Turkey consists of subcontractors Greenberg Traurig, Brian Forni, Lydia Borland, and Dickstein Shapiro LLP; the latter recently added to its lobbying staff former CIA Director Porter Goss. Other lobbying firms hired by Turkey are: Goldin Solutions, Alpaytac, Finn Partners, Ferah Ozbek, and Golin/Harris International. According to US Justice Department records, Turkey pays these lobbying/public relations firms around $5 million a year. Furthermore, several US non-profit organizations serve as fronts for the Turkish government to promote its interests in the United States and take Members of Congress and journalists on all-expense paid junkets to Turkey.

Among the US lobbyists for Turkey, perhaps the most questionable is Porter Goss, CIA Director from 2004 to 2006, who has agreed to sell his soul and possibly US national secrets for a fistful of Turkish Liras.

It is noteworthy that in a report Mr. Goss filed with the Justice Department under the Foreign Agents Registration Act, he avoided answering the question regarding his compensation from the Turkish government. He simply wrote: “Salary not based solely on services rendered to the foreign principal [Turkey]”!

In the same form, filed on April 23, 2015, Mr. Goss described his services for Turkey as follows:

  1. Provide counsel in connection with the extension and strengthening of the Turkish-American relationship in a number of key areas that are the subject of debate in Congress, including trade, energy security, counter-terrorism efforts, and efforts to build regional stability in the broader Middle East and Europe;
  2. Educating Members of Congress and the Administration on issues of importance to Turkey;
  3. Notifying Turkey of any action in Congress or the Executive Branch on issues of importance to Turkey;
  4. Preparing analyses of developments in Congress and the Executive Branch on issues of importance to Turkey.

It is significant that Dickstein Shapiro LLP, Mr. Goss’s employer, misled the Justice Department, by reporting two days prior to the start of his employment and three days before the Armenian Genocide Centennial, that the former CIA Director had already met on behalf of his lobbying firm with nine members of Congress to discuss “US-Turkish relations.”

Most probably, hiring Porter Goss as a lobbyist for Turkey was a reward for his staunch support of Turkish issues, while serving as a Republican Congressman from Florida from 1989 to 2004. During the October 2000 debate on the Armenian Genocide resolution in the House International Relations Committee, Cong. Goss, the then Chair of the House Intelligence Committee, testified against the adoption of the resolution, using the excuse that it would harm US-Turkey relations. Nevertheless, the genocide resolution was adopted by a vote of 24 to 11.

It is bad enough that former Members of Congress are selling themselves to anyone who is willing to pay them. But, the Director of the CIA…? This is more than unethical; it is a grave risk to US national security. The American government must not allow the sale of its top spymaster to the highest bidder! What if North Korea offered him a higher price? Would Mr. Goss jump ship and lobby for an enemy state just to make a few more dollars?