OGUN SAMAST’S PRESENCE IN ISTANBUL WAS KNOWN TWO DAYS PRIOR TO DINK MURDER
PanARMENIAN.Net
21.01.2010 13:11 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ A new document that may deepen the investigation
into the Hrant Dink assassination has been submitted to court by
Trabzon’s former police chief and current head of intelligence for
the Police Department, Radikal Turkish newspaper reported.
The document, sent by Ramazan Akyurek, features an intelligence
report on assassination suspect Ogun Samast that shows he was
under surveillance when he arrived in Istanbul. The document reads:
"His friends greeted Ogun Samast when he came to Istanbul." If the
document is genuine, it proves that Samast’s presence in Istanbul
was known two days prior to the murder.
The existence of the document was revealed to the public by Bahri
Belen, one of the Dink family’s lawyers, on CNN Turk’s "Tarafsiz
Bolge" (Neutral Zone) show Tuesday night. Another guest of the
show was Nedim Sener, author of the book "Hrant Dink Cinayeti ve
Istihbarat Yalanları" (The Hrant Dink Murder and Intelligence
Lies). Sener reminded that in the report, Akyurek was blamed by the
Prime Ministry’s investigation committee for neglecting his duty,
and responded to new questions on this recent development.
Sener said security forces were confessing their guilt and continued,
"If they knew he met with his friends, which branch of the intelligence
was following [him]? What type of data does Ramazan Akyurek have to
be able to know this?"
Journalist Oral Calislar, another guest of the show, said this was
a very important document and added, "If you knew when the man who
would commit the murder arrived in Istanbul, met with his friends,
you actually knew about the murder. If a government knew of a murder
[before] the murder was committed, then how can you put this to words?"
Hrant Dink (September 15, 1954 – January 19, 2007) was
a Turkish-Armenian journalist and editor-in-chief of Agos
Istanbul-based bilingual newspaper. Dink was best known for advocating
Turkish-Armenian reconciliation and human and minority rights in
Turkey. Charged under the notorious article 301 of the Turkish
Criminal Code, Dink stood a trial for insulting Turkishness. After
numerous death threats, Hrant Dink was assassinated in Istanbul in
January 2007, by Ogun Samast, a 17-year-old Turkish nationalist.