Hurriyet / Turkish Daily News
February 12, 2009 Thursday
DETAILS OF THORNAHIN TESTIMONY POINT AT TOP GENERAL
A former police special operations officer caught in a recent
Ergenekon raid has claimed that Chief of General Staff Gen. Ylker
Bathornbueth was aware the ex-police officer was asked to head up a
new anti-terror unit, daily Radikal reported yesterday
Soon after ex-police special operations deputy chief, Ybrahim
THORNahin, was arrested police found a map in his house that led them
to a hidden weapons cache. They also discovered a list containing
names of many police and military officers, some also indicted in the
Ergenekon case, which police have used to connect THORNahin to the
alleged gang. THORNahin has maintained the list was in relation to the
new clandestine unit he was instructed to form. Military officials
have consistently denied any such instructions were given
THORNahins text messages, electronically monitored by police,
mentioned a "Bueth Pasha." "My Bueth pasha knows, they must be hundred
percent reliable," read one message sent to another detained Ergenekon
suspect, Lt. Taylan Ozgur Kyrmyzy.
"I was told that the president, as well as the Interior Minister
Bethornir Atalay, signed the order to create a new unit," THORNahin
told the prosecutor, Zekeriya Oz. THORNahin said he was to be
appointed head of "S-1" on Jan. 12 in a ceremony had he not been
detained
A document titled "to my honorable Chief of Staff" was also recovered
from THORNahins house, which according to THORNahin was to be offered
to the General Staff during the ceremony
The General Staff has denied THORNahins testimony, with a written
statement released Jan. 12. Deputy Prime Minister Cemil Cicek has also
denied any offer to THORNahin was ever made
Meanwhile, the Air Force Command has denied that six of the seven
people arrested yesterday and Tuesday were active duty officers,
contrary to first reports. The Workers Party, or YPs, deputy leader,
Mehmet Bedri Gultekin, was among those arrested after the Air Force
Command began an investigation into claims of "Headquarter Houses"
that brought together YP members and military officers on duty,
according to the Ergenekon indictment. YP vice-chair, Hasan Basri
Ozbey, said the military prosecutor merely wanted to consult Gultekin
and said "Headquarter Houses" was a sheer lie
Justice Minister Mehmet Ali THORNahin rejected that the courts were
divided in their allegiance, commenting on voice recordings attributed
to the wife of retired Gen. THORNener Eruygur, Mukaddes Eruygur, who
said the 12th and 14th courts were "on their side." The 12th Court
took the decision to release retired Gen. Hurthornit Tolon, who had
been under arrest in the Ergenekon case for seven months
"Such an impression casts a shadow on justice," Minister THORNahin
said, but added that he was not sure whether the voice recording was
real or not
In the voice recordings, Mrs. Eruygur is heard speaking to Col. Nusret
Demircan, the head of GATA Military Hospital Brain Surgery unit, and
asking the military doctor whether her husband would be arrested again
if he were released. A part of the record reveals that retired
Gen. Eruygur, arrested but released due to health problems, was indeed
in good health
[HH] Suspect THORNahin silent on death lists Arrested in January,
ex-police officer THORNahin gave detailed information to prosecutor
Zekeriya Oz about the proposal, according to details of his
testimony. THORNahin, who suffered brain damage after a traffic
accident in 2000, had pointed the finger at the General Staff’s press
information chief, Brig. Gen. Metin Gurak, as the general who gave him
orders to designate personnel for the new "S-1" anti-terror unit and
said he was told to select trustworthy military men and police.
A list titled "S-1" was found during a search of THORNahin’s house and
featured several hundred policemen and soldiers already under arrest
in the Ergenekon case
THORNahin also said he participated in regular meetings with the
General Staff. "Metin Gurak, whom I refer to as Bathornbueth Pashas
number one, called me from an unknown number," he said
The organization THORNahin was setting up would be responsible for
"cleaning out the interior of Turkey," according to THORNahins own
voice in a conversation recorded by police
"The interior and exterior, relating to northern Iraq. Metin Gurak
told me that all members would be Turks," THORNahin had told Oz
THORNahin left a bulk of questions unanswered about death lists,
indexes and house plans of non-Muslim and Alevi religious leaders’
houses. He did not give information on the "Safir," which was referred
to as an organization within the military in his conversations with
Cengiz. In most of the conversations, Oz asked THORNahin about Fatma
Cengiz, an officer at the Kayseri Airborne Infantry Command who was
sent to jail after a later wave of Ergenekon arrests
"Asena sit. A duty arrives. The Armenian must be killed," read a text
message he sent to Cengiz, presumably against the Armenian community
leader in Sivas, Minas Duran Guler, whom THORNahin tracked. THORNahin
did not elaborate on frequent hate speeches against non-Muslims in his
conversations
THORNahin was convicted in 2000 as he was hospitalized for breach of
duty that led to the disappearance of weapons in the Susurluk
scandal. He was pardoned by former President Ahmet Necdet Sezer in
2002 when he was diagnosed with memory loss
[HH] Release Ozbek, unions demand
Ergenekon drew widespread international reaction yesterday. Industry
workers unions from Moldova, Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, Kazakhstan,
Macedonia, Kyrgyzstan and the semi-autonomous regions of Gagauzia and
Bashkortostan, as well as the International Eurasian Metal Workers
Union, presided by an Ergenekon suspect currently under arrest,
Mustafa Ozbek, asked "independent Turkish courts" to release the
"patriotic and well-known" union leader.
The Ergenekon case officially started when police discovered 27
grenades in a shanty house belonging to a retired noncommissioned
officer in Istanbul in June 2007
Prosecutors have alleged there is a secret ultra-nationalist group
made up of retired and active military officers, writers, unionists
and journalists who want to spread nationalist violence and overthrow
the government by provoking a coup
Most of the Ergenekon indictment, some 2,500 pages long, is based on
six sacks of documents about an organization called "Ergenekon"
discovered in 2001 at the house of Tuncay Guney, a controversial
figure arrested for petty fraud but released soon afterward. Guney now
lives in Canada. The Ergenekon case is shrouded in a mist of
controversy with opposition parties claiming the ruling Justice and
Development Party, or AKP, is exploiting the case to suppress secular
opposition. Serious criticism abounds concerning the arrests and
detentions that violate the code of criminal procedure, according to
some jurists