Etiket military

Turkey is taking military to civilian court

News, Etc. A spate of litigations against military personalities will most likely dominate the political agenda in Turkey after the parliament passed an amendment to the Penal Code enabling civilian courts to try army personnel for serious crimes. One of the first steps was taken by a group of lawyers who petitioned the Van Penal Court demanding that former chief of staff, retired general Yasar Buyukanit to be brought to trial for his conduct during the bookshop bombing case in Semdinli in 2005. Two non-commissioned officers and one former PKK (Kurdish Workers Party) member turned informer were caught by local people red-handed after a bomb exploded in a bookshop in southeastern town of Semdinli killing one person in 2005. Buyukanit, then serving as Turkey’s chief of staff, said, “I know him, he is a good boy,” referring to one of the two non-commissioned officers arrested after the incident. Ferhat Sarikaya, the prosecutor in Van who conducted the investigation, charged in the indictment that Buyukanit had set up an illegal paramilitary group in the region while serving there as the regional commander. According to Sarikaya, the illegal group was planning and carrying out provocations against the local people posing as PKK as well as involving in narcotics smuggling. The charges cost Sarikaya his job and he was banned by the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors, a civilian body overseeing the functioning of the judiciary, from practicing his profession. Association of Contemporary Lawyers (CHD) demanded that Buyukanit to be tried on charges of “influencing” the jurisdiction by his behavior, a serious crime according to Turkish law. The second demand came from Akin Birdal, a deputy of the Democratic Society Party (DTP), who had a narrow escape from an assassination attempt on May 12, 1998 while he was the President of Turkey’s […]

Turkey cannot disentangle itself from the “Action plan”

Niyazi Dalyancı The cacophony over the alleged “Action Plan against Religious Radicalism” continued to dominate the political agenda in Turkey as all the actors on opposing sides of the debate entrenched themselves in their positions refusing to yield an inch of territory to their rivals. Two separate meetings within two weeks between Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Chief of Staff Gen. Ilker Basbug lasting more than an hour each, seemingly did not help to defuse the tensions either. At a lengthy news conference at the headquarters of the General Staff, Gen. Basbug met with veteran Turkish journalists and declared that after meticulous research and investigation within the army ranks and computers, no evidence had been found that the document that outlined plans for undermining the government and eradicating the Fethullah Gulen movement was written by the allegedly undersigned Navy Col. Dursun Cicek. He said, since the forensic study was carried out on a photocopy, because the original was missing, the experts were not able to establish without doubt that the signature really belonged to Col. Cicek. No further investigation of the case would be carried out by the military prosecutors provided that no new evidence comes up, Gen. Basbug said, adding that the file was sent to the Chief Prosecutor in Istanbul. Displaying ire at certain times, Gen. Basbug called on the civilian prosecutors to “find out who produced this piece of paper and what their purpose is.” Turkey’s Army Chief complained that “certain circles” are conducting an “asymmetrical psychological warfare” against the armed forces and called on those “who are trying to define themselves and their political positions in terms of armed forces,” to “pull their hands off the army.” When he was asked who those circles might be, Gen. Basbug said: “We have certain information which we […]

Is the alleged “Action Plan” to undermine AKP government true or fake? One may never know!

Niyazi Dalyancı Whether a document containing plans to undermine the government allegedly written by a colonel at the headquarters of the Turkish General Staff is authentic evidence of the presence of a junta within the officer ranks or a fabrication leaked to the media with the purpose of discrediting the armed forces, dominated the political agenda in the country for the past week. Latest reports indicate that the public might never learn where the truth lies. The public debate over the document was launched in full fervor after the Taraf newspaper published it last week claiming that it was found among the evidence seized at the office of a lawyer who is presently under arrest as one of the defendants of the Ergenekon trial where nearly 200 suspects including officers, university professors, journalists, lawyers and police chiefs are charged with setting up an armed terror organization to overthrow the elected government in Turkey. Scores of defendants including top ranking generals are presently under arrest. The document titled “Action Plan for the Struggle Against Religious Radicalism” and dated as recently as April 2009, targets both the government of Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and the so-called Fethullah Gulen community, that has become increasingly influential in the country’s social and political scene in recent decades. The alleged plan includes a wide-range of measures, including “planting weapons, documents and material” that would point to illegal activities at houses used by the community, launching a media campaign discrediting the government and claiming that officers arrested under Ergenekon have been imprisoned because of their activities against radical Islam. The campaign plan is also aimed at accusing the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government of leading Turkey towards a society run according to Islamic Sharia law. It also mentions plans to implant agents within AKP to create […]