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Retired General Commander of Gendarmerie Galip Mendi has confirmed crime boss Sedat Peker and Atilla Peker's statements about a 1996 assassination attempt on journalist Kutlu Adalı from Cyprus.
Sedat Peker claimed in a YouTube video on Sunday that he had been approached by Korkut Eken, a senior intelligence officer at the time, about an assassination attempt on Adalı. "I gave him my brother," he said.
His claims were followed by his brother's application to the Fethiye Chief Public Prosecutor's Office yesterday (May 24). In his petition, Attila Peker explains in detail how he and Eken traveled to Cyprus and how the assassination attempt failed.
Adalı was later assassinated in front of his house but the perpetrators could not be found.
"Korkut Eken visited me"
General Mendi, who headed the Civil Defense Organization in Northern Cyprus at the time, told Odatv news portal that he was visited by Eken and Atilla Peker before the assassination.
"Korkut Eken is an elder of ours who served in the Special Forces Command. He is a person I respect. A heroic officer," he said. "He also visited me. He was together with a person named Atilla Peker. I didn't know him at the time. I found out later that he is Sedat Peker's brother."
In his petition, Attila Peker said, "I met Galip Mendi. Then, in the next room, Korkut Eken gave me the Uzi weapon."
When asked about this statement, Mendi replied, "Korkut Eken had a briefcase. But I don't know what was inside."
Eken told him that they had come to Cyprus after obtaining intelligence that some members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) had received treatment in the country, said Mengi.
Eken also met Lieutenant General Hasan Kundakçı, the commander of the Peace Force Command, Turkey's garrison in Northern Cyprus, he added.
"Eken didn't tell me anything about Kutlu Adalı. He said that intelligence work would be carried out in relation to the PKK. And we assigned him a white Renault Toros. We were in Lefke anyway, Kutlu Adalı was in Nicosia."
"Adalı's killing has nothing to do with us"
Shortly before his assassination, Adalı was writing articles about an armed robbery of millions of dollars worth of icons in Saint Barnabas Monastery in Famagusta.
"The Civil Defense Organization didn't have an armed force. The Peace Force Command received a tip-off and obtained information that the PKK had buried weapons in that area. A search was made there.
"The white Renault Toros car used in that search was assigned by the Civil Defense Organization. Because that car was seen during that search, it was said that the same car was used in Kutlu Adalı [murder] and the Saint Barnabas Monastery raid."
Mendi, who was appointed to a position at the Special Forces Command shortly after the assassination, said "This incident has nothing to do with us."
The assassination of Kutlu Adalı
Kutlu Adalı, a journalist from Northern Cyprus, was shot dead in front of his house on July 6, 1996, shortly after writing an article about the armed robbery of millions of dollars worth of icons from St. Barnabas Monastery in Famagusta, Cyprus. In his article penned on March 23, 1996, nine days after the robbery in question, he wrote that the official vehicles affiliated with the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) Head of Civil Defense Organization were used during the related raid. While he was known as nationalist and patriotic by the Turkish politicians and his circle in Cyprus, he was a dissident of Rauf Denktaş, the then TRNC President. His house was targeted in an armed attack after penning an article about Denktaş titled "The lunatic at the minaret." In his articles, Adalı was talking about a series of paramilitary organizations operating in Cyprus. He was alleging that several murders committed before Turkey's "Cyprus Peace Operation" in 1974 were in fact committed by them and the Cypriot Greeks were blamed. On April 2, 1996, Adalı announced that he was receiving threats. The complaints of Adalı were not taken into account by the security officers. Adalı was shot to death in front of his house on July 6, 1996. The investigation launched by the Northern Cypriot authorities remained inconclusive and it could not be found who had committed the murder. So, his wife İlkay Adalı applied to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and filed a suit against Turkey. Handing down its judgment on March 31, 2005, the ECtHR convicted Turkey on the grounds of "the failure to carry out an adequate and credible inquiry into the murder." What did Sedat Peker say?Accused of leading a criminal organization and currently abroad, Sedat Peker has been attracting millions of views to his YouTube videos about the "state-mafia relations" in Turkey, He targets current and former government officials, especially Minister of Interior Süleyman Soylu and former Interior Minister Mehmet Ağar. In his 7th video shared on May 23, Sedat Peker made some allegations about the assassination of Cypriot journalist Kutlu Adalı: "At that time, we were all together, Mehmet Ağa, Korkut Eken... We were young, we were patriots. They would usually give me jobs related to businesspeople rather than unsolved murders," he said, referring to the widespread extrajudicial killings at the time, for which both Ağar and Eken stood trial. A court yesterday overturned their acquittal of killing 19 people. "[Eken] told me that 'There is a man in Cyprus, he wants to sell Cyprus to the Greeks.' He said 'two professionals'... I told him 'I'll give you my brother, Atilla Peker.' He is a specialist, he grew up on the streets. "Another team affiliated with them killed [Adalı]. I came across brother Korkut, he said to me 'That job is done.' "Atilla Peker will tell the truth. If we killed him, I'd say we killed him. It's time-barred now. I always watched his spouse's struggle from afar. What should I say? We are all the same." After the video, Attila Peker was detained in a villa in Fethiye's Kayaköy Neighborhood. Police officers also detained Yunus O., who is said to be his bodyguard, and seized an unlicensed gun and two magazines. Taken into custody together with his private guard, Atilla Peker was released on probation with an international travel ban. The Fethiye Prosecutor's Office has also launched an investigation into the assassination of Kutlu Adalı. Speaking in a live program on Habertürk TV on May 24, Minister of Interior Süleyman Soylu announced that he had given an instruction for an investigation into the death of Kutlu Adalı, who was killed in an armed attack in front of his house on July 6, 1996. |
(HA/VK)
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