PULSE of TURKEY No:75 ............................ DECEMBER 2^nd,  1998

The never-ending fight against organized crime becomes the Government’s problem in both domestic and external policies, but attracts security forces’ appreciation and support. Of over 2000 unknown murders all have been uncovered thanks to the fight against organized crime, and the TL1 quadrillion cut off from the drug Mafia is transferred to low income groups, says the Prime Minister. For the impressive list of the eliminated gang of organized criminals and its impact on the formation of the government, see the article below.

At the end of its routine monthly meeting under President Demirel on November 30^th, the National Security Council (NSC) called for “an uninterrupted fight against organized crime.” On the same day the Turkish General Staff (TGS) issued a statement urging politicians to refrain from dragging the Armed Forces into politics and announcing that they were judging politics by the principles, outlooks and actions of political parties and not on the basis of their “styles”. This was in answer to the public statement by FP (Virtue Party) Chairman, Recai Kutan, that the Armed Forces were pleased with his party’s style and supporting it. Again on the same day, PM Mesut Yılmaz issued a half-an-hour televised statement “to give an account” to the nation of his Government’s 17-month performance in power.

Broadside on Deniz Baykal from the Yılmaz-Ecevit team

He especially stressed how organized criminals had infiltrated into Turkey’s political system and managed to topple his Government when it cut off their TL1 quadrillion drug money and transferred it to people with low incomes. It was a subtle criticism of, and insinuation of Mafia involvement by, the CHP (Republican People’s Party) Chairman, Deniz Baykal, when he made a rush move to bring the Government down a month earlier than the agreed upon time.

Even though PM Mesut Yılmaz was rather subtle and indirect about his accusations of Deniz Baykal, the Deputy Chairman of ANAP, Yaşar Okuyan, was more outspoken. He told Radikal (Nov 12^th) at the outbreak of the Korkmaz Yiğit scandal, which ended up in the downfall of the Government, that Alaattin Çakıcı said in France: “The duty is incumbent on the CHP to topple the Government.” Okuyan said, “It seems that Baykal is acting on Çakıcı’s instructions.” Addressing the CHP he remarked, “What is all the panic about? Are you worried that as the skeletons come out of the cupboard, as organized criminal gangs are disbanded, as investigations are deepened, something will appear that involves you?”

At his party’s rally in Balıkesir, DSP (Democratic Left Party) Chairman Bülent Ecevit demanded Baykal to answer the following questions, reports Yeni Yüzyıl (November 16^th):

1. During its four years in the ruling power coalition, which gang of organized criminals, which Mafia was prosecuted by the CHP and its forerunner, the SHP?
2. Why did Baykal keep in hand for a long time the Çakıcı-Yiğit tape-recording?
3. Yılmaz has revealed to the public in all detail his reluctant talks with Korkmaz Yiğit. Why does Baykal refrain from revealing to the public his hour-and-a-half secret talk with Yiğit?
4. Loans were given to Korkmaz Yiğit from İşbank. The CHP members’ signatures are on these documents. We know the amounts involved. We want Baykal to reveal them.
5. The signatures of CHP members are on the $175 million loan to Evcil from İşbank. Why does Baykal not make revelations about it?
6. For weeks there were full-page advertisements of the CHP in newspapers and on the TV. Why does the CHP not reveal the amounts involved in this publicity and their sources?
7. Baykal and some CHP rulers claimed that they have files against DSP ministers. Why don’t they make any announcements about these files?
8. CHP rulers claimed that my signature was on the document for the sale of Türkbank to Korkmaz Yiğit. Didn’t the CHP rulers know that I am not authorized on this matter and consequently my signature is not on such a document. Or were they knowingly misleading the public with lies?

PM Yılmaz’s address centres around drug money and organized crime

PM Mesut Yılmaz said during his televised address that terrorism was a three-headed scourge - separatist terrorism, organized crime terrorism and religious fundamentalist terrorism.

Explaining the first, separatist terrorism, he said that 27 630 people had been killed hitherto – 5302 were made up of women, children and aged civilians. The Government’s effective fight against it was cutting off the resources and drying out the roots of this secessionist terrorism. He pledged to make the world too small a place for chief terrorist Abdullah Öcalan to live in.

About the second terrorism by gangs of organized criminals, he said they had brought to daylight one by one all of the over 2000 unknown murders. The gangs had been disbanded and their leaders arrested at home and abroad.

“Deadly blows have been delivered to drug trafficking which feeds both the gangs and secessionist terrorists. The frightening fact is that the drugs seized in Turkey in a year account for 60% of the drug smuggling seized in Europe and 40% in the world. These enormous amounts of drugs passing through our country provide TL1 quadrillion to dark forces every year,” said the Prime Minister. He explained that TL1 quadrillion meant providing TL1 billion to each person in a city with a population of one million, like Bursa. It equals one million times one billion (10 to the power of 15 or 10¹⁵), he stressed.

“We marched against such a dark power. It is for the people to judge whether we have been successful or not. Those who thought that they could play with this State, with this nation, have learnt their lesson. The gangs wanted this Government to be toppled. They overtly and covertly worked hard for it. The Mafia leader expressly said, ‘Bring down this Government’.”

PM Yılmaz also noted that fundamentalist terrorism had planned to kill the President and Government members at the 75^th year celebrations of the Republic and again on the anniversary of Atatürk’s death on November 10^th. He went on, “In the end, this Government has been toppled, but what has been toppled is only the 55^th Government of the Republic. Our fight, our belief and our willpower are firm, rock solid. We are committed to continue with this fight,” he said.

Explaining the Government’s economic performance he said they had four achievements. 1) Inflation was curbed from 100% a year ago to some 50% now. 2) Tax reform was put into force and brought the unregistered economy under registration. It also increased tax revenue even though it cut down tax rates by between 10% and 15%. “This way we provided low income groups with more than TL1 quadrillion. In other words, what we cut off from the gangs and terrorists we provided to the people.” 3) Compulsory education was increased from five years to eight and the system was modernized with computers and other modern devices. 4) The energy problem was solved. Arrangements were made for adding 20,000 MW installed energy to Turkey’s electricity generation capacity that had reached 22,000 MW in 75 years.

Highlights of the Yılmaz Government’s fight against organized crime

The main achievement of the Yılmaz Government in the fight against organized crime was due to its arrangements aimed at coordinating the joint work of MIT and the Police. Thanks to this joint work Mafia infiltration in the Administration was uncovered and uprooted from the system. In 1997-1998 the security forces disbanded 180 gangs of organized criminals. The following are the highlights of these anti-terrorist and anti-Mafia achievements:

• The PKK “commander”, Şemdin Sakık, and his brother, Arif Sakık, were captured in Northern Iraq on April 13^th, 1998 and brought to Turkey.
• International drug trafficker Hüseyin Baybaşin was arrested in the Netherlands on March 25^th, 1998.
• Kurşat Yılmaz, who was the organizer of a big number of murders, was arrested in Bolu on April 7^th, 1998.
• “Idealist” Godfather Alaattin Çakıcı was arrested in France on August 17^th, 1998.
• “Idealist” gangster Sedat Peker was captured in Romania on August 19^th, 1998 and brought to Istanbul by a special aircraft.
• Sedat Şahin of the underground world was captured in Germany.
• Yaşar Avni Musullulu nicknamed “Sarı Avni”, who was the Mafia chief of drug and black money trafficking in the 80s, was captured in Balıkesir on November 5^th, 1998.
• Assailants of Akın Birdal, the President of the Human Rights Association, Semih Tufan Gülaltay, Cengiz Ersever and Mehmet Cemal Kulaksızoğlu were arrested and thus the gang called TIT (Turkish Revenge Brigade) was disbanded.
• 23 militants of the Kaplan community were arrested with the charge of a suicide attack on the Mausoleum on Republic Day and November 10^th.

In addition to these “Godfathers”, Mafia members Ferhat Dopdoğru nicknamed “Zaza Ferhat”, Iskender Çolak, and former bodyguard of Tansu Çiller Ferda Temel, who turned out to be a gang leader, were arrested along with Hadi Özcan, Mehmet Öztel, Ahmet Tekin Baykal and Mehmet Köymen. The assailants of PM Mesut Yılmaz in Budapest, Veysel Özerdem, Ziya Korkut and İsmail Koçkaya were arrested in Romania and Hungary. Mehmet Sümbül and Yusuf İlhan were brought before the court with the charge of killing businessman Nesim Malki who was allegedly a black money launderer.

Minister of the Interior Kutlu Aktaş said that they were not fighting against terrorism only, but also against gangs of organized criminals and the Mafia.

Purge in the Administration of Mafia or fundamentalist infiltration

All these prosecutions of organized criminals are the result of months of investigation by using high-tech equipment in the hands of well-educated specialists who were gathered together in ten different teams in the Police and MIT.

Now that sufficient information has been compiled, purges are being made of the suspected Mafia or fundamentalist infiltrations in the Administration, under the instructions of the NSC. On September 19^th PM Mesut Yılmaz gave detailed information about the measures being taken against organized crime.

The military has already been carrying out these purges even before the present Government’s anti-Mafia drive. They will continue. The Supreme Military Council (SMC) will convene on December 4^th under PM Mesut Yılmaz with all 4-star generals in attendance and discharge, on grounds of lack of discipline, officers and NCOs who engage in reactionary movements or those who are involved in extreme left- or extreme right-wing organizations .

At the June session of SMC, 162 and in the August session 24 officers and NCOs were discharged from the Armed Forces for the same reasons.

This routine and regular purge of reactionairy tendencies in the Armed Forces is now spreading to other important State agencies such as the Ministry of Justice, the Religious Affairs Organization and the Police. Several of the above defendents or convicts are already former policemen. They were brought to key positions when Mehmet Ağar was the Director-General of the Police or the Minister of the Interior.

Now a purge is going on in the Ministry of Justice and again it involves the people brought to key positions when Mehmet Ağar was the Minister of Justice. While Ağar is facing trial with the charge of setting up gangs of organized criminals, the people placed in key positions by him are being eliminated. These include the Personnel Chief of the Justice Ministry, Faruk Bal, the Director-General of Prisons, Çağatay Kayıran, and the Deputy Under-Secretary of Justice, Hüseyin Karakullukçu. Justice Minister Hasan Denizkurdu’s decree about these dismissals has been signed by President Demirel.

Faruk Bal had several supporters in ANAP too, but with PM Mesut Yılmaz’s support of Denizkurdu, he was removed from office because of his involvement in reactionary movements. Bal had attempted to remove from office several prosecutors, chief prosecutors and judges for their actions against reactionary movements, but they were changed at the HSYK (High Board of Judges and Prosecutors) when there were criticisms in the press. Bal was trying to promote or bring to key positions pro-RP (Welfare Party) or pro-MHP (Nationalist Action Party) judges and prosecutors. On the other hand, he was assigning to remote places the Chief Prosecutor of Sarıyer, Veli Engin Aslan, for investigating Ömer Lütfü Topal’s murderers and the Chief Prosecutor of Rize, Hamdi Yaver Aktan, who prosecuted the “idealist” Godfather Sedat Peker.

The NSC, at its routine meeting on September 30^th, reviewed a 15-page report by the Religious Affairs Organization on “The Fight Against Religious Fundamentalism”. State Minister Hüsamettin Özkan expained the highlights of the report and the measures taken to curb fundamentalism. The military members of the NSC were especially emphatic about giving no concessions on the question of headscarves in universities and government departments. The Constitutional Court’s rulings about it were stressed.

At the same session the NSC expressed appreciation of the Government’s anti-terrorist activities and fight against organized crime. It called for the legislation of “The Bill for Fighting Organized Crime” to facilitate this fight.

Even though two months have passed since that statement by the NSC, far from legislating the bill, the Government has lost power with an untimely vote of no-confidence.

The new Government is now under review and it is sure to be formed in a way not to need the CHP’s finicky support so that the fight against terrorism, religious fundamentalism and organized crime can continue “uninterruptedly”. That leaves behind only the ANAP-DYP and DSP coalition. The most difficult link of this chain, the DYP, is bound to come round when Tansu Çiller wakes up from her dream of being the Prime Minister with the CHP’s and FP’s support. uras@ada.net.tr, December 2^nd 1998

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