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Turkey Cumhuriyet journalists draw front page battle line against Erdoğan

June 2, 2015 By administrator

he front page of Cumhuriyet published on Tuesday. (Photo Today's Zaman)

he front page of Cumhuriyet published on Tuesday. (Photo Today’s Zaman)

With their names and photographs accompanying a headline that reads “We are responsible [for the story],” journalists at the Cumhuriyet daily have responded to a threat made by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan against the paper’s editor-in-chief for running a story and photos that provided proof of illegal arms shipments to Syria.  report ZAMAN

Speaking during a live broadcast on the state-run TRT Haber news channel on Sunday night, Erdoğan said: “I have filed a lawsuit [against the editor-in-chief]. … And the person who did the exclusive report about it will pay a heavy price for it. I won’t let him go [unpunished].”

The Cumhuriyet article said “We employees at Cumhuriyet assume responsibility along with our editor-in-chief for the story revealing the truth about an incident that was denied by state officials for months.” It is a journalist’s duty to inform the public about the dangers and threats of an arms smuggling incident whose political, legal and diplomatic remifications the public is not aware of, the article added.

In a headline story on Friday, Cumhuriyet published images from a video in the investigation file proving that National Intelligence Organization (MİT) trucks had carried weapons, contradicting the government’s earlier claim that they were only carrying humanitarian aid to Turkmens in war-torn Syria.

Erdoğan, who claimed the daily’s sole aim in publishing the report on the trucks operated by MİT was to tarnish Turkey’s image, accused the daily of being involved in spying by having published the report.

Dündar also challenged Erdoğan in a message on Twitter on Monday, saying: “The person who committed this crime will pay a heavy price for that. We will not let him go [unpunished],” also maintaining that Erdoğan is the one who is involved in crime by arranging arms-laden trucks to be sent to rebel groups in Syria.

On Jan. 19 of last year, three trucks bound for Syria — which the government admitted were operated by MİT — were intercepted by gendarmes in the southern province of Adana after prosecutors received tip-offs that they were illegally carrying arms to Syria. Shortly after top officials gave statements about the trucks, Syrian Turkmens denied that any such truck had arrived from Turkey.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: Can Dündar, Cumhuriyet, MİT trucks, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Syria, Turkey

How much prove The USA need that Turkey is “ISIS” Kılıçdaroğlu: I watched video of weapons in Syria-bound MİT trucks

May 20, 2015 By administrator

CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. (Photo: Today's Zaman, Ali Ünal)

CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu. (Photo: Today’s Zaman, Ali Ünal)

Main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu told journalists on Tuesday that he saw video footage showing arms and ammunition in Syria-bound trucks belonging to the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) which were stopped by gendarmes and police last year.

Speaking with journalists from the Hurriyet daily at a breakfast on Tuesday morning, Kılıçdaroğlu said the security of Turkey’s Syrian border will be made as strong as pre-2011 levels once the CHP becomes the government. “Illegal border crossings, migrant smuggling and arms smuggling will not be overlooked,” he declared.

Confirming a recent revelation by Yasin Aktay, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) deputy chairman responsible for foreign affairs, who said on video that MİT trucks were carrying arms to the anti-regime Free Syrian Army (FSA) rather than to the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), Kılıçdaroğlu said the gendarmerie and police filmed the opening of the crates on the trucks inside which can be seen arms and ammunition. “I watched. It is not possible to hide it. It was not humanitarian aid loaded in the trucks.” He added.

The short video, posted on Saturday on the Oda TV website, shows Aktay arguing with a local man who was apparently criticizing the government for supporting ISIL.

In the video, which Oda TV said was recorded in the southeastern province of Siirt, Aktay is heard having a discussion with the man, who says ISIL militants are given treatment at Turkish hospitals in Adana and who accuses the government of supporting ISIL’s offensive on Kobani. During the conversation, the man asks about the trucks, which he says are carrying arms to ISIL.

“They were going to the FSA,” Aktay responds, “and the FSA’s number one enemy is ISIL.”

Top Turkish officials, including President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, have maintained in the past that the trucks were carrying humanitarian aid to Turkmens in Syria. Aktay is the first person to reveal that the weapons-filled trucks were on their way to the FSA.

In January 2014 Turkish gendarmes and police stopped the Syria-bound trucks in Adana and Hatay after prosecutors received tip-offs that the vehicles were illegally carrying arms to Syria. The weapons were allegedly destined for extremist groups in Syria, including ISIL and al-Qaeda affiliates.

The government has called the interception of the trucks, which turned out to be operated by MİT, an act of “treason and espionage.” Four prosecutors who ordered the trucks to be searched and a gendarmerie officer have been arrested in connection with the interception.

Source: Zaman

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: ak party, Free Syrian Army, ISIL, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, MİT trucks, Yasin Aktay

Turkish Prosecutor says weapon-laden MİT trucks made 2,000 trips to Syria “full to the brim with weapons”

May 13, 2015 By administrator

truck-load-of-weaponA pro-government prosecutor who was appointed to the case regarding the alleged transport of weapons and munitions to Syria via trucks belonging to Turkish intelligence filed for a verdict of non-prosecution regarding the case and adMITted that weapon-laden trucks made 2,000 trips to Syria, according to the lawyer of one of the defendants of the case.

Lawyer Hasan Tok, the legal counsel for former Adana Provincial Gendarmerie Regiment Commander Col. Özkan Çokay, who was at the scene when trucks belonging to the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) were searched in January 2014, said that Prosecutor Ali Doğan stated in court that trucks owned by MİT made at least 2,000 trips to Syria.

Doğan is a known government loyalist and filed for a verdict of non-prosecution regarding the investigation into the trucks after he was appointed to the position of Adana chief public prosecutor. According to Tok, Doğan had asked the defendants in a previous hearing, “2,000 trucks have passed [into Syria] why was this one specially chosen?”

“We didn’t know there had been 2,000 trucks passing into Syria, may God bless Ali Doğan,” said Tok.  Report ZAMAN

Ali Doğan’s reference to 2,000 trucks echoes an alleged statement by MİT head Hakan Fidan in which he said he “sent around 2,000 trucks [with] equipment” to Syria after General Staff Gen. Yaşar Güler complained that the region needed arms and ammunition to be saved. A voice recording was published online in March 2014 of a top-secret conversation between then-Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioğlu, Fidan and Güler, revealing Turkey’s clandestine effort to aid certain groups in Syria.

Prosecutor Takçı: someone had sworn an oath to get us convicted

Aziz Takçı, one of the four prosecutors involved in an investigation of trucks belonging to the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) that were allegedly carrying weapons to radical groups in Syria, said in his defense statement to the Tarsus Second High Criminal court regarding the investigation of the MİT trucks, “Someone [in the government] had already sworn an oath to convict us [prosecutors investigating the MİT trucks]. We also know that some people [within the government] were pressuring the HSYK [Supreme Council of Judges and Prosecutors], saying, ‘Why aren’t the detentions [of prosecutors] happening sooner?’” said Takçı in his statement to the court, according to GriHat news portal.

Turkey has wanted Syrian President Bashar al-Assad removed from power ever since an uprising that started at the end of 2011 turned into a fully-fledged civil war in the neighboring country. Assad is a member of the Nusayri (Alawite) sect, an offshoot of Shiite Islam, whose members are a minority in both Syria and Turkey.

Prosecutor: trucks were full to the brim with weapons

Describing the events that unfolded on Jan. 19, 2014, when trucks later found to belong to MİT were stopped in the Ceyhan district of Turkey’s southern Adana province en route to Syria, Takçı said: “When I went to the scene there were two trucks. A few stubbly bearded men, claiming to be MİT operatives, were shouting, swearing. As I had gone to the scene of the search, I had to look at what was there. [The trucks] were full to the brim with weapons…155mm [howitzer] shells, anti-aircraft munitions; I also saw munitions of different types and sizes.”

“I told the gendarmerie [present at the scene] to record these items, what else can a prosecutor do? Then out of nowhere, the chief public prosecutor of Adana, the chief police officer, and Governor Hüseyin Avni Coş [all] came to the scene with 400-500 riot police. The governor told me that Prime Minister [current President Recep Tayyip] Erdoğan had called him and had said, ‘These trucks belong to MİT, we sent the weapons and ammunition. The prosecutor must leave the trucks, we are going to lay the [necessary] legal framework,’ several times,” said Takçı.

“In the meanwhile, Hüseyin Avni Coş was saying that he was going to obstruct this [investigation] even if it would mean his death. I told him, Mr. Governor, you don’t need to say such things. The state has laws. No one needs to die, if [as you say] the Prime Minister [Erdoğan] has called. Then I asked him to present me a [official] document with only a few sentences, which I could sign, and told him repeatedly that if the individuals who claimed they were MİT operatives gave their IDs, they could be released,” said Takçı.

Takçı said that after he had the license plate of the vehicle carrying the people claiming to be MİT operatives checked, he found that it belonged to suspects known to have affiliations with al-Qaeda. “Al-Qaeda is recognized as a terrorist organization by the Supreme Court of Appeals. It [Al-Qaeda] is on the ministerial cabinet list and the world’s list [of recognized terrorist organizations],” he said.

MİT agent double-crossed Syrian colonel, while I’m being charged for espionage

Takçı also said in his statement to the court that MİT operative Önder Sığırcıklıoğlu, who sold out a Syrian colonel who had defected to the Free Syrian Army from the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) controlled by Assad for $100,000, was absolved of espionage charges while he was being charged with espionage for investigating the trucks.

Three MİT officials, including Sığırcıklıoğlu, were arrested in 2012 for allegedly abducting Col. Hussein Harmush, one of the most senior Syrian military officers to have defected to the opposition Free Syrian Army, from a Turkish refugee camp in the southern province of Hatay near the Syrian border and handing him to pro-Assad forces in Syria for $100,000.

As the Adana Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office had formally charged five suspects, one of whom was a MİT regional official, for their supposed role in handing over Harmush to Syrian security forces, it appeared that MİT was deeply involved in the abduction. The suspects were sent to prison, where they face charges of political espionage.

Takçı: you don’t have to be a prosecutor to know that the case can be linked to terrorism

Stating that there is no need for suspicion and that only a shred of doubt is enough for public prosecutors to act, Takçı said: “They [prosecutors] are asking me why I took [members of] the law enforcement agency with me. Who am I supposed to undertake the investigation with as a public prosecutor? Of course, with members of the law enforcement agency. Moreover there is talk of a truck full of weapons.”

“Who can carry a truckload of weapons? You don’t have to be a public prosecutor to know that such a crime is being has the suspicion of being [affiliated to] terrorism,” he said.

Even if undersecretary to MİT had come, he’d have to prove his link to trucks

Pointing out that, after he had ordered the trucks to be stopped and searched, another vehicle carrying individuals claiming to be MİT agents came to the scene, Takçı stated that the newly arrived operatives started to argue with gendarmerie personnel at the scene, demanding the search be stopped, even using curses insulting Takçı’s mother. Takçı said, “I wanted to see their identification, but they refused, so I told [the gendarmes] to keep them under control while the search was going on.”

Admitting that one of the operatives had later complied with his request to show identification, Takçı emphasized: “The people in civilian vehicle, which came later, these weren’t the people in the trucks. I have to be frank: Even if the undersecretary of MİT had come, he would have had to make his connection to the trucks very clear.”

Takçı: Drug smugglers are convicted, while weapons smugglers are to be released

Even if the trucks were proven to belong to MİT, as the prosecutor, he would have had to collect any evidence before it was lost, Takçı explained, adding: “A MİT operative was caught in Van [province] with a substantial amount of drugs on his person, no one said to him, ‘Oh, you’re a MİT agent, [sorry].’ The evidence was put forward, and he was detained, arrested and later convicted… Those who are caught smuggling 50 kilograms of drugs are to be convicted, while those who are caught smuggling three trucks worth of weapons are to be let go? What a country to live in!

Takçı: Legal decisions influenced by ruling party are most dishonorable

“Is this [government] always going to remain? Is there always going to be this ruling party? In the future, the political landscape will change and another party will come [into power],” he remarked, continuing: “The [new] ruling administration will come and say to me: ‘Why did you not see these pieces of evidence? Why did you allow this car to leave? Come and account for your actions.’ Are we to change our decisions based on the political party in power right now? I consider this to be dishonorable. If a judge or a prosecutor renders a decision according to the [views of the] current political party, then that person is the most base, most parasitical, most dishonorable person there is, as I would be, if I had let my actions be influenced by the party in power.”

Prosecutor Karaca: Site where weapons were dropped now an ISIL base

Another of the four prosecutors involved in the investigation, and currently under arrest, Ahmet Karaca, said in his defense statement that, before the investigation into the trucks belonging to MİT had begun, an investigation into rocket warheads found in the province of Adana was already underway, adding: “The driver of [one of] the trucks said, ‘I’ve taken 2 loads like this before. I deposited them at the same spot,’ and the place he indicated, close to the Turkish-Syrian border, is, unfortunately the place where the terrorist organization [the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL)] now holds camp.”

A total of 935 rocket warheads, manufactured in Adana and Konya provinces, had been seized from a truck in the southern province, then-Governor of Adana Hüseyin Avni Coş told media in 2013.

Pointing out that 85 citizens had lost their lives in terrorist attacks between 2012 and 2013, and that the investigation into the trucks is now open to the public, Karaca stated, “Those trucks were full to the brim with weapons.” He expressed his grief at being persecuted for simply performing his duty, stating: “If you find one piece of evidence linking me to crime, I’m willing to serve time without even the need to submit a defense. Send me [to jail] and I’ll go without blinking an eye.”

 

Filed Under: Articles Tagged With: MIT, MİT trucks, Syria, Turkey, weapon-laden

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