CONVERSATION REVEALS DIRTY DEALINGS IN BANK CONFISCATION

Today’s Zaman
14 August 2008, Thursday
Turkey

Transcripts of phone conversations seized during the investigation into
Ergenekon, a shadowy network whose suspected members are accused of
having planned and staged attacks and assassinations for the ultimate
aim of toppling the government, have revealed curious conversations
between high-profile bureaucrats and media bosses concerning the
takeover of a failed bank in the year 2002

The transcripts — which are included in evidence backing the
prosecutor’s indictment against a total of 86 Ergenekon suspects,
47 of whom are currently in custody — indicate that media groups,
bureaucrats at state banking agencies and government personnel together
arranged for the takeover of a bank confiscated by the state.

The conversations are about Pamukbank, which was confiscated from
Cukurova Holding, owned by Mehmet Emin Karamehmet, in 2002 in a
controversial takeover by the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency
(BDDK) allegedly to recoup nearly $6 billion owed by the bank.

One of the transcripts that was seized from an Ergenekon suspect’s
home is the record of a phone conversation between then BDDK Deputy
President Ali Vural and Veli Dural, a board member of Dogan Holding,
a Cukurova rival, and also owner of the biggest media group in
Turkey. The call occurred at 5:30 p.m. precisely two days before June
18, 2002, the day the bank was taken over. The BDDK bureaucrat asks
for media support to shift public opinion in favor of the takeover
during the phone conversation.

The BDDK’s Vural also calls a man he refers to as Mr. Anderson,
the deputy chief consultant of Citibank at the time, on the morning
of June 18, 2002, the day of the takeover. Mr. Anderson stated that
the business group he represents is irritated by the Cukurova Group,
noting that Turkey’s economy will improve again with the help of
Kemal Dervi?, the economy minister during the post-economic crisis
period in Turkey. It is not clear why Mr. Anderson’s bosses were
uneasy about Cukurova.

Aydın and Yılmaz arrange the deal

In response to a question on the Pamukbank deal, Vural tells the
Citibank chief consultant: "Sir, do not worry at all about that
deal. Everything was handled personally by Mr. [then Deputy Prime
Minister Mesut] Yılmaz and Mr. Dogan [Aydın Dogan, head of the
Dogan group]."

In the same conversation, Mr. Anderson says: "This holding has
grown so big it now spells trouble for us. The people I represent
are very unhappy about this. The company will be distributed as we
have planned."

‘I will teach Engin a lesson’

In a conversation between Yılmaz and Vural on the morning of June 18,
Yılmaz tells Vural that he will remove BDDK chief Engin Akcakoca
from office. Yılmaz asks Vural: "Why hasn’t Engin called me? Why
isn’t he calling me about this?" and Vural replies, "I don’t know,
sir." Yılmaz then states: "Tell me the truth, where is Engin? He is
finished. I will replace him. I am thinking of you instead of him,
what do you say to this?" Vural replies: "As you deem fit, sir. He
told me to call you. He says he gets sick of your questions." Yılmaz
replies: "So that’s how it is. The prince needs to learn his lesson. I
will teach him his lesson once he gets this over with."

A brief history of corruption in Turkey

Between the years 1985 and 2000, before new business reforms were
enacted to fend off corruption, evidence of large-scale corruption —
mostly in public tenders — was discovered almost on a daily basis.

The corruption claims that emerged during the coalition government of
the Democratic Left Party (DSP), the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP)
and the Motherland Party (ANAP, now ANAVATAN) were mainly related to
public tenders for energy projects, earthquake relief work and highway
construction. Then a wave of corruption hit the finance sector,
as many banks, including Turkbank, Demirbank, Pamukbank, Etibank,
Egebank, Ä°nterbank, Ä°mar Bank, Sumerbank, Turkbank and Toprak Bank
announced losses due to high debt.

Background on Ergenekon

The existence of Ergenekon, a network thought to be a part of a
phenomenon known as the deep state in Turkey, has been known of for
some time but its official discovery occurred in the summer of 2007,
when police discovered a shanty house in Ä°stanbul being used as
an arms depot. More than 40 suspects, including former generals and
other ex-army members, academics, journalists, businessmen and mafia
bosses have been arrested in the ensuing investigation, which took
nearly a year to complete.

The indictment made public last month claims the Ergenekon network
is behind a series of 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 first hearing
of the trial is scheduled for October.

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