DINK CASE MAY HELP IN ERGENEKON OPERATION
Bianet
Istanbul Internatioanal Independent Media Forum
17 Aug. 2009
Dink family lawyer Fethiye Cetin believes that the Dink murder trial
may help to find those involved in the Ergenekon organisation who
are still in official positions.
02 Nisan 2008, Carºamba Ever since Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant
Dink was murdered in front of his office on 19 January 2007, lawyers
for his family have tried to get to the bottom of the organisation
behind the murder. It is widely believed that the young men on trial
for the murder are only the front men.
The recent investigation into the ultranationalist Ergenekon gang,
said to have planned a military coup against the government and to
have been involved in other illegal activities, points to connections
between the Dink murder and the illegal organisation.
"A great opportunity" Fethiye Cetin, one of the Dink family lawyers
and joint attorney in the main murder trial in Istanbul, gave an
interview in the Taraf newspaper on 31 March, in which she said:
"There are many connections between Ergenekon and the Hrant Dink
murder. Using the statements of the two gendarmerie officers (who have
said that their superiors in Trabzon knew of the plans to kill Dink)
we can get at the police and gendarmerie wing which is still working
for Ergenekon. This is a great opportunity."
Cetin: "Colonel is part of the organised murder" The Trabzon
gendarmerie superior, the then province gendarmerie commander
Colonel Ali Oz will be questioned by the Parliamentary Human Rights
Sub-Commission today (2 April) because of the accusations.
Cetin said, "The Colonel’s crime is not simple negligence. This
colonel was part of an organised murder in some way."
A suspected member of the Ergenekon gang who has been arrested,
Assistant Professor Emin Gurses, said, "I knew that Dink would
be killed three months before and told the police and intelligence
service about it." Cetin says that the lawyers will request that he
be heard in the murder trial hearing.
Hayal’s "important contacts" She added that the prosecutor and
lawyers were still not being given all the evidence in the murder
trial. For instance, murder suspect Yasin Hayal had been monitored
by the Trabzon police ever since his involvement in the bombing of a
McDonald’s there. When the Istanbul 14th Heavy Penal Court demanded
the documents relating to the monitoring, one part of the document
had been covered. When the full document was finally sent, it showed
that Yasin Hayal had "made important contacts" in prison when arrested
in the case.
Cetin says that Hayal is said to have met Veli Kucuk, a retired army
general and main suspect in the Ergenekon case, as well as Levent
Temiz, the president of the ultranationalist "Idealist Hearth"
movement.
"Time for Istanbul police to come clean" The lawyer argued that the
Turkish Armed Forces have begun a process of getting rid of some of
the Ergenekon members in its ranks.
"The Trabzon police has closed the case, but the investigation into
the Istanbul police continues. In order to start a cleaning up like
in the gendarmerie, Istanbul Chief of Police Celalettin Cerrah and
Police Intelligence Chief Ramazan Akyurek need to be removed from
office, so that junior officers can talk more freely."
Deliberate racist incitement in Black Sea region Cetin also suggested
that there was a deliberate policy of inciting racist hatred in the
Black Sea region. Veli Kucuk was on duty in Giresun, the province
next to Trabzon. On retirement, he was replaced by gendarmerie Field
Officer Dursun Ali Karaduman, who made headlines for declaring Hrant
Dink a traitor at the funerals of fallen soldiers and reading a poem
with the same message.
"Kucuk and some generals incited a fear of a Pontus Greek revivalist
movement in the Black Sea region (i.e. claiming that Greek Christians
were trying to reclaim the area). There are no efforts to find out
what happened in the murder of Priest Santoro in Trabzon. Contradictory
statements of the murder suspect about where he got the gun from where
not even researched. No one is taking responsibility for that trial."
"With the statement of the gendarmerie officers, there is a new
dimension in the Ergenekon case and the operation is reaching
members of the security forces who are still in office. This is a
very important opportunity. With the Dink trial, those Ergenekon
members still in office can be reached."(EO/GG/AG)
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress