Wednesday, January 31, 2007

THE REAL TERRORISTS STRIKE AGAIN

"I appreciate so very much the example your country has set on how to be a Muslim country and at the same time a country which embraces democracy and rule of law and freedom."
~ George W. Bush, in Ankara, 2004.


Well--if you can stand it--there's more bad news. It was waiting there for me in my email this morning, from a friend.

It looks like the Ankara regime is continuing its attacks against intellectuals and journalists within Turkey, from Atilim:

Haci Orman, chairman of the cultural institute BEKSAV and consultant of our newspaper, has been taken under arrest by force today in Kadiköy, Istanbul.

The arrest and imprisonment terror, based on the new antiterror law and started in September last year, is continuing. Haci Orman, chairman of the cultural institute BEKSAV and consultant of our newspaper, has been kidnapped today at 13.45pm next to the bank 'İş Bankası' in Kadiköy, İstanbul. According to eye witnesses, Orman has been forced to get on a car of the type 'Beyaz Sahın' with the license tag 34 EC 933 after he was handcuffed. Orman answered this arrest by force with resistance. He shouted his name and job title loudly and also expressed that he was going to be kidnapped. Eye witnesses called immediately the Human Rights Association IHD and told them about the incident.

Orman is right now being held at the antiterror unit in Vatan Street. It is claimed that Orman has been wanted after the arrest terror in September. Orman had been threatened with guns and chased in Kadiköy by teams of the antiterror unit a few months ago.

This kidnapping attack, which happened right after the assassination of Hrant Dink, is another attack in the chain of attacks on intellectuals. With these new attacks, the state which wants to hide the truth about the assassination, tries to warn the social opposition, intellectuals, workers and labourers 'to be silent'.



Ah, blessed silence that conceals innumerable crimes!

That's the way, isn't it? For a fascist regime, it's the only way because a fascist regime cannot justify its crimes against the people . . . but SHHHH! Say nothing, report nothing, pretend to see nothing.

A fascist regime hides behind a facade of law and democracy while its prisons burst with political prisoners. But do you hear any of this from the EU? No, because the EU is a commercial club; it is concerned solely with its bottom line and will permit Turkey to enter as long as the balance sheet stays in the black, therefore "civilized" Europe ignores the fact that the balance sheet is dripping with red.

What about the Americans? They are exactly the same as the Europeans. What passes for government in the US is a collection of bottom-feeders dredged from war profiteers like KBR, Halliburton, and Bechtel; the war industry, best represented by Lockheed Martin but also composed of lesser blood-suckers; and then there are the up-and-coming mercenary companies epitomized by Blackwater, USA; after all of these come the hyenas, the lobbyists, composed of a pack of has-been bureaucrats and Dime-a-Dozen Generals, as Sibel Edmonds has aptly put it.

The ideological fuel of the system comes from the ultra-conservatives, the neocons, or the Baker-Hamiltons, who wile away their time in poison factories euphemistically referred to as "think tanks," all funded, of course, by the murderers listed in the previous paragraph. In these factories skulk the lowest of the low, those with no morality or honor, the little gears and pulleys of their brains creaking away in an effort to find the most cost-effective method of consigning millions to the fascist client states that are held up for the democratic edification of the world--Türkiye! These modern-day honorary members of the Order of the Death's Head are lately beating their war drums for Iran, so that they can feed the system, increase their domination of energy resources and provide another record year of earnings for their war industry.

Meanwhile, back in the TC, in the Middle East's shining Model of Democracy, people like Haci Orman are kidnapped in broad daylight, in one of the world's largest cities, by "terror" police (perfectly named since spreading terror is their raison d'etre), all for the sake of greasing the machine, the system, the worldwide Deep State.

What is the crime of people like Haci Orman? They encourage solidarity among oppressed groups, as in this example of a BEKSAV event in Istanbul last November:


The opening speech was held by Haci Orman, chairman of the administrative council of BEKSAV. Orman started his speech by saluting the ESP activists who had been imprisoned in Amed, Kurdistan, the ‘country whose name is forbidden’. He continued and said: ’Ankara is the capital of the bourgeoisie. You cannot dwell there. But the 46 ignited the streets [*46 ESP activists were imprisoned in Ankara, after a militant mass action against isolation in the prisons (7th December, 2004)]. Today, the police brutally attacked the ESP activists which sold the newspaper Gündem on the street in order to show their solidarity. Greetings to the ESP activists who resist in Ankara!’ Orman saluted the prisoners by saying ‘There are blood and teeth marks at the prison walls of Bolu, Tekirdağ, Edirne, Sincan and Bayrampaşa. There are slogans full of resistance on these walls’ and also greeted the prisoners who had been arrested on September 8 and 21 by saying: ‘Despite the arrests, imprisonments and oppression, we are here again defending our posts’. In his speech he also gave examples of history explaining that social changes and progress cannot hindered with oppression, massacres and imprisonment.

[ . . . ]

Following the programme, Hilmi Yarayıcı went onstage and gave a solidarity message against the terror of the anti-terror law. He was followed by Gökhen Birben and his songs which let the crowd feel the tempered waves of the Black Sea. The crowd danced the traditional dance of Laz people and sang the song 'Denizde karartı var' which is dedicated to Kazım Koyuncu. After Birben, it was Koma Denge Hevî's and Agire Jiyan's turn to go onstage. With their Kurdish songs, enthusiasm reached its peak.

[ . . . ]

The event was a strong and vivid indicator for the defence of the associations and institutions in a legitimate way which had to face fascist terror and for the hope standing tall despite the attacks aiming at breaking the hope.


Their crimes also consist of protesting the terror state and its new "anti-terror" law (TMY) [Note: Check that document for a list of imprisoned journalists and a list of intellectuals, activists, and journalists who support the work of Atilim]:


While Turkey continuously claims to be in the process of democratisation, on the other hand, it blows a total state-terror in the whole country. The offices of the democratic organizations are being raided, their activists are being imprisoned, massacres are being carried out by attacking demonstrations and meetings, even the children are being shot on the streets. There was recorded an increase of applications to the Human Rights Association because of torture. There is now being put in force the implementations which are similar to the periods of military fascist coups and martiallaws.

In recent months, the state-terror on the democratic rights and organizations has been increased by the use of the new Anti-terror Law (TMY), which is considered as the Anti-Social Law by the democratic public opinion. TMY was put in force despite the opposition of democratic mass organisations, human rights organisations, intellectuals, trade unions, workers and labourers.

[ . . . ]

There has been created a total state-terror and extra-ordinary conditions in Turkey and N. Kurdistan. This is the point which the attacked organizations, the democratic people and organisations reached to and which we share also. Through these attacks, the socialist and oppositional press is wanted to be put in silence and the voice of unionists, workers and labourers, youth and women those who struggle for their rights is wanted to be shut down. The Turkish state has almost waged a war against the entire society with the new TMY. It is hunting for human in the offices of organizations, houses and on the streets. The freedom of press, freedom of action and freedom of organization is being violated; the journalists and writers are being put in prison. The Kurdish nation’s call for freedom and peace is responded with violence.


Hrant Dink was a victim of that violence; Haci Omran is now a new victim. How is it that anyone can speak of stability, when state violence is routinely and consistently applied to the very individuals and groups who demand nothing more than the same rights that citizens in Western democracies take for granted? Does anyone believe that we will hear an outcry for the latest victim from the great democratic citizens of the West? Don't hold your breath; those citizens have been permanently anaesthetized by the manure-shovelers of the mainstream Western media.

Once again, the veil is pulled back briefly, and we catch a glimpse of the monster at the heart of the Deep State's reality.

Tuesday, January 30, 2007

THE HOLLOW MEN IN THE LAND WITHOUT HOPE

"Shape without form, shade without colour,
Paralysed force, gesture without motion"
~ T. S. Eliot, The Hollow Men.


Cengiz Aktar has a pretty good opinion piece over at TDN in which he seems to nail the nationalist (i.e. fascist) monster on the head:


Since the murder of Hrant Dink, anger has been expressed in various ways. The silent march of Jan. 23, which people from all walks of life joined, was a genuine demonstration. Citizens expressed their sincere feelings. However this was no turning point. This was not a reaction which was shared by the whole country, from east to west. I wish it had been.

This was rather a consolidation of those who shared the humanistic, democratic, open-minded and self-confident worldview that was represented by Hrant Dink, but who are also on the way to extinction. It was the instinctive gathering of a herd which lost a member to hunting hyenas. Just as is the case in game parks...

Let's not confuse these lands, whose inhabitants go between servitude and fatalism, with the France of '68.


Great line and true. In spite of the outpouring of emotion and the subsequent demonstration during Hrant Dink's funeral, there's no way Turkey could be mistaken for 1968 France. Why? As Cengiz says, because there is no support for reform from either the state or the politicians. Like others have already done, he notes that "the state and politicians fled the funeral in haste. Let's consider the insincere approach of the politicians as a calculation for the coming elections."

It's a calculation, all right, a calculation designed to pander to the lowest common denominator: the fascist sentiments of the masses. Like a good politician, Erdogan was off pandering to fascism by attacking one organization that stands for far more democracy than Erdogan ever has: the big, bad PKK.

Let's consider too, that Erdogan had the extremely important duty of attending the official opening of a tunnel. From TNA:


The [ANAVATAN] party's Mardin deputy, Muharrem Dogan, raised allegations that the construction firm had said the [Mt. Bolu] tunnel was not complete and that they are not responsible for any accidents.

The tunnel was opened last week with a ceremony attended by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Italian counterpart Romano Prodi, after over 5,000 days of work. After a couple of accidents reportedly due to bad weather conditions and slick frost, the tunnel was closed to avoid further accidents.

Dogan asked the premier whether the speculation is true. "Why did you open the tunnel despite a statement from the construction firm that the electrical system for the tunnel had not been completed?" asked the deputy.


Why? Very simple, Mr. Dogan; Erdogan had to flee an Armenian's funeral. He would have used the Bolu tunnel excuse to escape the Pope if it would have worked. Campaign pandering. The fascist population simply will not vote for someone who attends an Armenian funeral, and Erdogan knows that very well . . It doesn't matter if all the rest of the world is watching.

Along with doing nothing with infamous Article 301--as well as doing nothing about racist school textbooks--Cengiz predicts how the political campaigns will use Armenian Genocide resolutions to circle the wagons:


Moreover, the country soon will face the anti-Turkey dimension of the matter with the genocide bills in France and the United States. The dominant rhetoric will use these developments. I can see statements like, if Hrant were alive, he would get angry, from now to turn the reaction, anger and sadness of today in the opposite direction. This would sweep aside the anger felt towards the Dink murder and consolidate the process of Turkey's closing itself to the world.


He notes that it is the Deep State at work, doing what it does best, stirring up emotion in the service of fascism to protect the privilege of the relative few who form the Deep State. And Cengiz finds it impossible to conclude without a reference to Germany of the 1930's. Yeah, that's it! Not France of 1968, but Germany of 1939. Or Eastern Anatolia of 1915 . . . and from 1925 until the present day.

Erdogan's campaign message must have reached Turkey's soccer fans, again from TDN [Note: Bear in mind that these are Trabzon residents suffering from their own stupidity . . . and you know what I mean]:


Trabzon, one of the biggest towns of the Black Sea Region, has been under a magnifying glass during the last two years due to a number of events, from the lynching of families seeking prisoner rights to the murder of journalist Hrant Dink by a local youth.

[ . . . ]

To show their anger, Trabzonspor fans on Sunday took their places in the stands of the Kamil Ocak Stadium with flags and banners that read "We are all Turks, we are all Mustafa Kemal," "I am Turkish, I am from Trabzon" and shouted slogans like "Martyrs never die, the country's unity will always remain in place."


Then there's Demirspor's idiot chairman, Adem Ailgan, who, last week, was "deeply sorry" for the murder of Hrant Dink, but now stumbles all over himself to reaffirm his "Turkishness":


Aılgan on Friday, following a series of reactions from the fans and the people of Adana, said he had been misunderstood. "I was deeply touched by the murder and Dink's wife's speech at the funeral. But I should have said, 'We are all Turks. I am a Turk; my father is a Turk and also a hadji. I apologize to the Demirspor community."


Ha, flake. Funny, his dad was a Turk and a hadjii. Who gives a damn? I wonder what political office he's running for? Then the dogs, or rather, Gray Wolves, came down from Elazig to Malatya:


Elsewhere, Malatyaspor entertained Elazığspor in Dink's hometown Malatya, and around 400 Elazığspor fans opened a banner that read; "We are not Armenians, We are not from Malatya, We are Elazığ, We love Turkey."


So much for the concepts of sin and shame. What a bunch of losers.

Well, there you have it. There really isn't any hope. If Turkey cannot come to terms with the Armenian Genocide, which happened almost 100 years ago, it cannot come to terms with its continuing Kurdish genocide. No, there really isn't any hope at all. Since we have nothing to lose, we might as well keep fighting.

Monday, January 29, 2007

INCITEMENT TO HATRED . . . BY WHOM?

"Unfortunately, they do not represent the Turkish public. The Turkish public has not filled the streets with demands of democracy and freedom. They were leftists, Armenians, Kurds and those intellectuals who favor multiculturalism."
~ Selami Ince, on Hrant Dink's funeral.


Well, the good news is that the boys in TİT (Turk Intikam Tugayi--Turkish Revenge Brigade) have learned how to use email, from Bianet:


Agos newspaper received an e-mail threat today. Founder of the bilingual newspaper, Turkish-Armenian writer Hrant Dink was gunned down by an extremist nationalist last Friday.

Lawyer of the newspaper Fethiye Çetin said they immediately filed a complaint about the threat, which was signed as Turkish Revenge Brigade (TİT), a notorious clandestine group responsible for several killings of leftist militants during 1980's.

"This is their last efforts to intimidate us. We'll do what's necessary and won't tolerate such threats", said Çetin.

Reminding the hundreds of thousands who gathered for Hrant Dink's funeral yesterday, "We'll overcome these obstacles in solidarity", she said.

The e-mail message threatens of a bomb attack to the newspaper, which continued receiving such threats even after Dink's assassination.


The bad news is that TİT is still allowed to exist, but that's the inconsistency that lies at the heart of Turkey's version of democracy. Another inconsistency is the fact that Article 216 of the new TCK (Turkish penal code) is selectively applied. Here's a brief description of Article 216, again from Bianet:


Article 216 (new form of Article 312) - Instigating a part of the people having different social class, race, religion, sect or region to hatred or hostility against another part of the people in a way dangerous for the public security: up to 3 years (if committed by the means of media, to be increased one-half).


So why is it that the producers, and everyone associated with the airing of the Turkish TV series "Valley of the Wolves," is not slapped with Article 216? Check it out, from TNA:


Top Turkish TV series "Valley of the Wolves," whose portrayal of alleged "deep state"-mafia ties hit a responsive chord with viewers, also ends up promoting violence, according to a new study by a young scholar.

Zeynep Gultekin from Gazi University's Radio, Television and Cinema Department did her master's thesis on the series, examining the "mafia series as a product of pop culture."

[ . . . ]

Gultekin studied 55 episodes of the series for its relation to pop culture, characters, presentation of violence and nationalism, and TV's role in reflecting the truth

[ . . . ]

In the 55 episodes examined, Gultekin found 145 instances of curses and insults, 296 shouting incidents, 174 threats, 149 insinuations, 113 denigration, 124 humiliating remarks, and 122 instances of mocking.

The thesis underlined that violence and its methods were clearly shown in the series, as in only 55 episodes weapons were used 145 times. Furthermore in 226 scenes weapons were shown, in 111 clashes occurs, 411 people were shown being killed, and 152 were shown injured. Gultekin also counted 137 attacks, 147 beatings, 155 slaps, 110 acts of torture, three rapes, 191 acts of harassment and four kidnappings.

Gultekin argued that the series highlighted nationalistic ideologies by using crescent, flag and map images. She also counted nationalistic elements within 55 episodes. The Turkish flag appeared in 216 scenes, while Turkish maps appeared in 299 scenes and the crescent was seen in 117 scenes.

According to the thesis, words relevant to nationalistic ideologies were also used hundreds of times. "State" was used 246 times, while both "country" and "nation" were uttered 128 times. "Turkey" and "freedom" were said 163 and 112 times respectively.

"Polat Alemdar is the protagonist of Valley of the Wolves, with his bravery, good will, and self-sacrificing and honest character," said the thesis. "Alemdar always wears a black suit and white shirt, drives luxury cars and shows the gun he carries in nearly every scene, and he is depicted as a 'character with positive values' since he can do anything for his nation."

Gultekin claimed that the series even praises violence and carrying arms.

In her thesis' conclusion, Gultekin argued that pop culture works must be prepared with utmost care as televisions are instruments of mass communication.


And people wonder why there's a problem in Turkey? Why Hrant Dink was murdered? Why residents of Trabzon almost lynched prison protestors, mistaking them for Kurds, while police stood by to watch the show? Why someone like Yasin Hayal only gets 11 months for bombing McDonalds? Why ultra-nationalists accuse "outside forces" for the murder of Dink or why the blame is placed on the Armenian community? Why we all know that this murder has changed nothing?


A headline in the right-wing newspaper Tercuman said that those who aren't proud to be Turkish "should clear off and leave." The article ran a day after a threat against Nobel prize-winner Orhan Pamuk by a handcuffed suspect charged with inciting the murder of Dink.

Turkey's largest nationalist party responded to the mourners' chants by posting its own slogan - "We are all Turks" - on a digital display outside a local party branch in the Mediterranean resort of Antalya.

And in a chilling sign that the suspects have their supporters, a fake bomb was left outside the Turkish parliament building saying they should be set free, CNN-Turk reported Thursday.


Who, then, is most worthy of charges under Article 216?

In other news, CNN-Turk had an interview with Nicholas Burns, US Under-Secretary for Political Affairs, the third-ranking position at the US State Department. In addition to being impressed by the TC's "strong statement condemning this [Hrant Dink's] murder," he issued the usual platitudes about how Dink's murder was despicable, an act of terrorism (a phrase to promote US business policies), and that the perps should be brought to justice. Burns also managed to avoid the question about a resolution on the Armenian Genocide in Congress, something that the State Department will oppose as bad for American business interests . . . particularly with regard to the war industry.

Burns reiterates the US position on Kerkuk because there is no way that the US will relinquish control of Kerkuk's oil to Turkey and, at the same time, reiterates US support for Turkey over Kurds. Nothing new there.

The interview concludes with a question about Maxmur, and Burns replies that the US wants to clear out Maxmur by dumping the Kurdish refugees from Turkish-occupied Kurdistan into Turkish prisons for their political beliefs:


First of all, we are standing with Turkey, with Turkey, in support of Turkey in the battle against the PKK. The PKK is a vicious terrorist organization. It’s been sanctioned by the United States. We are Turkey’s partner in convincing other countries, European countries, to take a tough stance against it and we are going to support the Turkish Government in insisting that the number of attacks against Turkish soldiers and civilians be diminished. As you know, we are working with the Turkish and Iraqi Governments to try to see if there is a solution to these attacks and to this problem. The Mahmour Camp has been a source of support in some respects for the PKK and we must not allow that to continue. So, frankly, it was a very important first step for the U.N. authorities….with the Iraqi authorities; excuse me with the assistance of the United States to make an inspection of that camp, that is a first step. We will do more and ultimately our country believes that the Mahmour Camp should be closed. The people should be repatriated back to their home countries, many of them are Turkish citizens. And if the PKK continues to use Mahmour for support, or for any other reason, then I think there will be a great initiative to try to close that camp as soon as possible.


Working for one of the world's largest terrorist organizations--the American government--Burns is definitely in the know about terrorist organizations. In this statement we see that the US agrees to stand by Turkey even though an American raid on the camp last week turned up not a single bullet. It's also contrary to the UN's findings since the American raid:


A UN a census in the Mahmour refugee camp in northern Iraq on Friday declared the camp "civilian," though Turkey has long argued the camp has become a political propaganda and recruitment center for the terrorist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

The census followed a security operation of Iraqi security forces backed by the U.S. military on the camp on Jan. 17, which was welcomed by Ankara. The Turkish Foreign Ministry stressed that Mahmour had completely fallen under the control of the PKK and lost any humanitarian role.

"We expect, in line with our call for elimination of the terrorist PKK/Kongra-Gel presence in Iraq, that these steps will continue and will yield results," the statement said.

However, an official from the office of United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) told the press in Mahmour that following the operation early this month, Friday's census proves the civilian character of the camp. "From now on the UN will have a stronger role and control over the camp," Marco Roggia said. He added that identification card of the residents will be renewed following the census.


Because Turkey falsely claims that Maxmur is a PKK camp that has "lost any humanitarian role," it will imprison and torture all the refugees if they are forcibly "repatriated" with US assistance. Although Maxmur camp leadership says that the refugees are ready to return to their homes in Turkish-occupied Kurdistan as soon as a general amnesty is granted, it's doubtful how many would voluntarily return. For one thing, the TC cannot be trusted so any amnesty plan that is cooked up will be questionable. For another, the refugees may not be able to return to their homes anyway. In December 2006, Human Rights Watch issued a report on Turkey's compensation law to return IDP's to their villages. HRW found that the law was created as a ruse to fool the ECHR and avoid embarrassing international court rulings:


Since the ECtHR announced its decision in the İçyer case, there has been a noticeable deterioration in the implementation of the Compensation Law by provincial damage assessment commissions. The damage assessment commissions appear to approach their task in a much more grudging and arbitrary way, resulting in absurdly low compensation amounts. For example, in a recent decision by the Diyarbakır damage assessment commission, a family that has had no access to its house, crops, or silkworm business since they were destroyed by soldiers in 1993 was offered a total compensation amount of 5,000 Turkish Lira (TL) (US$3,350).

[ . . . ]

Damage assessment commissions appear increasingly to apply arbitrary and unjust criteria in calculating compensation, sometimes in defiance of the law’s own implementing regulations. These calculations appear consistently to favor the government and to be biased against the victims of government abuse.

Commissions manipulate government compensation scales to whittle down the value of family homes—by calculating house values on the basis of values for cowsheds, for example. In the region where most displacements took place, income was primarily earned through animal husbandry, but in defiance of the law, damage assessment commissions will not compensate any losses associated with livestock. They also implement a host of invented “rules” in order to exclude applicants and diminish state liability.

Thus, the Compensation Law is being implemented in a manner that directly undermines the stated purpose of the law and the government’s express intent. It also undermines the possibilities for displaced villagers to obtain just compensation and hinders their ability to return to their pre-war homes.


There you have it, another inconsistency with respect to law and democracy, things which are utterly meaningless in Turkey.

Back in Ankara, US Ambassador Ross Wilson is also in denial over the reality of the Kurdish situation, from TNA:


Wilson argued that successful action against the PKK is possible through stopping financial and other support that comes to it from Europe, and cooperative action by Turkey and Iraq, including the Kurdistan regional government in the north, to better secure the border. Wilson said "this partnership and cooperation would not only abolish the deep disappointments and intimidate the PKK terrorism, but would also bring an end to the problem or at least put an end to the international elements of the problem."


Wrong. The situation of the Kurds under Turkish occupation is a political problem which will not be solved by attempts to cut off funding or to secure the border. There is no possible way to "intimidate" PKK or end the problem until there is a political solution, and the US knows this. But the US also knows that it cannot control the region unless it continues to foment instability, which has been the status quo for decades. The US intends to continue this strategy with no concern for the price paid on the ground, in order to maintain US hegemony and keep Lockheed Martin stock at an all-time high.

Notice too that Lockheed Martin's Joseph Ralston will arrive in Turkey this coming Tuesday and Wednesday to discuss more business opportunities with Edip Baser. This follows the signing of a joint memorandum with the US for the Lockheed Martin JSF program last Thursday, which should bring in over $5 billion for the Turkish economy:


Earlier, a senior procurement official said that Turkey expected to obtain a work share worth more than $5 billion for its local defense industry in the manufacture of the F-35s."We have so far secured a local work share worth $4.2 billion," said the official. "With the addition of some more contracts, we expect to be well over $5 billion."

The bulk of local work is due to go to Tusaş Aerospace Industries (TAI), Turkey's main aerospace company, which for example will manufacture the center fuselage for 400 F-35s.



Peace does not pay.

By the way, a little bird sings to me that Lockheed Martin's "special envoy for coordinating the PKK for Turkey," some Turks, and their Iraqi partners met today in South Kurdistan to talk about the refugees at Maxmur, and then they visited the Maxmur camp. Sounds to me kind of like Heinrich Himmler and his henchmen visiting camps.

Sunday, January 28, 2007

VALLEY OF THE WOLVES BALTIMORE

"The Turkish soldiers suppose that this an ordinary visit from their NATO allies. But this time it is different. . . The soldiers were led out of their headquarters at gunpoint, with hoods over their heads and subsequently detained for sixty hours before being released. . . . One of the Turkish officers, unable to bear the shame of the hooding, committed suicide."
Kurtlar Vadisi Irak: Wikipedia.


Are Turkish mercenaries hired by an American company operating in Iraq? Let's see, from Baltimore's The Daily Record, carried on FindArticles:


With offices in Turkey and Iraq, Black Hawk Security Inc. is not a typical Montgomery County company.

It's not a typical security company, either. The Potomac-based business provides armed security and other services to coalition forces helping to rebuild war-torn Iraq, said Cihan Atkin, Black Hawk's project coordinator.

"We're kind of like a private army," Cihan said.

Huseyin Atkin, Cihan's father, founded Black Hawk in October 2004 after five scouting trips to Iraq for his construction company, NET International Group Inc. Huseyin decided many of the existing private security companies were too inexperienced - some couldn't tell the difference between combatants and those unfortunates who were just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

[ . . . ]

Huseyin said the answer is a company such as Black Hawk. The security company employs only people with special forces backgrounds and pulls many of them from Turkey and other Muslim countries. They are more sensitive to cultural issues that can cause conflict, as well as more likely to be accepted peacefully by Iraqi citizens, he said. The company also makes a point of hiring ex-American and ex- British special forces personnel to lead its security teams, as they have an easier time making connections with the coalition forces in Iraq.

Huseyin said he has lived in America for 20 years and called on his own military background and his experience with training U.S. and Turkish special forces and Turkish police officers in forming the company.


Being involved with Turkish special forces and Turkish police (Ozel Timler and Ozel Hareket Timler) means that the people running this company are Turkish ultra-nationalists, no different than those that have made the news recently in connection with Hrant Dink's murder. From the Wilson Center:


The special teams were organized to take the combat directly to the PKK, as a form of unofficial ‘‘special forces.’’They operate in small groups and are specially trained in counterinsurgency tactics. They dress in civilian clothes and sometimes even in PKK-style uniforms, such as they are, and are nominally under the control of the Ministry of Interior. They have been heavily recruited from the members of the Nationalist Action Party, and they often wear the gray wolf insignias that are the symbol of the nationalists and of the MHP. They are very well paid (between $800 and $1,100 a month), and are often signed up for contracts of six years or so, rotating in and out of the region periodically. There are an estimated 22,000 to 23,000 of these team members.

There are two types of special teams: those that are part of the gendarmerie, and those that belong to police units. While the former go by the name Special Team, the police units are known as Special Action Teams (Ozel Hareket Timleri). The special teams have gained a reputation for brutality, killings, and vigilante-type violence. As such, they have earned the enmity of Kurds, and their removal from the area is one of the key demands of all Kurds in the region. Despite their nominal subservience to civilian authorities, they have often flouted those authorities if they have proven less than willing to cooperate with the special teams in brutalizing the population.

[ . . . ]

There is increasing concern among many Turks that the special teams are gaining a vested interest in violence, that they will be difficult to disband because of the MHP party affiliation of many of them, and that they will represent the kernel of future vigilante groups in the large cities who may operate against Kurds there in general. Already there have been reports of troubled special team members rotated to other parts of the country getting involved in acts of violence and retribution against Kurds.

They have clearly gained a degree of autonomy from the army and the civilian authorities. [ . . . ] In the long run, the adverse conditions under which they work and the training they have received make them prone not just to psychological difficulties but also to the kinds of problems faced by the ‘‘Afghans,’’ the trained Muslim anti-Soviet fighters who, with the end of the Afghan war, have sold or volunteered their services for other militant causes.


Ozel Timler were also caught while attempting to conduct black operations in Kerkuk in April and July of 2003. The July incident resulted in the "bagging" of the ever-courageous Ozel Timler and inspired the wildly popular Turkish fantasy film, Kurtlar Vadisi Irak. With a training facility just a few feet away from the Habur border crossing in Turkish-occupied Kurdistan, what exactly are these former Turkish "special forces" doing in Iraq? Given that KDP sources in Kerkuk have reported MIT activity in the area, are these Turkish mercenaries operating there? Are they running reconnaissance operations in South Kurdistan for the Turkish and American governments?

How well would a "stateless proxy" of Turkish mercenaries serve Turkish interests? Last month, TCS Daily published a two-part article discussing the virtues of mercenaries (or stateless proxies) in the service of the undefined global War on Terror, Inc. Among the reasons why nation-states would find such stateless proxies attractive are the following, from Part 1:


1. A lack of other means: Many states lack the means to perform their own security effectively. . .

2. Plausible deniability: . . . Some states may wish to pursue policies covertly that would bring harsh and swift retaliation from their enemies if they were overt.Many states wish to pursue policies covertly that if pursued overtly would bring massive opprobrium upon them, from the press, their own electorate, their allies, or the "international community." The use of proxies in pursuing such policies might be one way to avoid such retaliationStateless actors might allow a bit of discretion or separation that would otherwise be impossible.

3. Circumvention of Laws: States may wish to circumvent their own laws or international regulations in the pursuit of certain policies. One solution is to make a deal with a stateless organization that can operate with much more extralegal freedom than can a state organization. . .

4. A Lack of Political Will: There may be times when states are compelled to pursue policies that their populations cannot stomach. . .


Consider reasons 2, 3, and 4 in light of Turkey's role in the region and its desire to extinguish the existence of the Kurdish people. Seen in this light, a Turkish mercenary company with a training facility in Silopî would be just the thing to meddle in South Kurdistan, thereby bestowing a degree of plausible deniability for both the Turkish and American governments; it would circumvent international laws, especially those designed to protect "territorial integrity," which Turkey is so fond of claiming for itself; and it would bypass any discomfort caused by a lack of political will in light of EU accession or the Turkish public's desire to avoid international military adventures . . . such as those in Iraq, Afghanistan, or Lebanon, as examples.

Part 2 of the TCS Daily article on the developing ideology surrounding the use of mercenaries outlines some of the desirable characteristics of "stateless proxies" (referred to as "Anti-Qaeda"), including the following:


One of the prerequisites would be freedom of movement: The forces of Anti-Qaeda would possess the ability, whether legal or not, to cross international borders at will.

Anti-Qaeda would be free to develop its own network of contacts throughout the world. Many of these would be within the intelligence agencies and militaries of established states. These contacts might actively feed information to Anti-Qaeda as a result of the policies of their states. Alternatively, they might do so merely out of sympathy with the goals of Anti-Qaeda, and might be approached and recruited in the same manner that foreign intelligence agencies attempt.

One way or another, money would not be an issue for Anti-Qaeda. Through some system of donations, it might raise funds directly from sympathetic people all over the world. It might receive contributions from states, though it will be hesitant to do so if strings are attached. For example, a state might fund the organization with one large endowment-like contribution, allowing it to operate as a trust in perpetuity, though without any oversight from the state.

This comes to a final characteristic about Anti-Qaeda: it would operate best in an environment of state forbearance. States might gain information about Anti-Qaeda activities that would make for evidence in prosecutions, but they might decide not to enforce the law in the case of Anti-Qaeda.


The Black Hawk Security, Inc. training facility in Silopî indicates something else. How does a company like this get permission to operate in "The Southeast?" Not just anyone can arrive in Silopî, buy some land, and build a military training facility a few short yards from the Habur border crossing into South Kurdistan. You have to have connections--the right connections--connections that lie in the Deep State, connections with the Turkish general staff. Similarly, how does one run such an operation from the United States? Again, by having American Deep State connections. In both cases, Black Hawk Security, Inc. is operating "in an environment of state forbearance."

It was, in fact, the "bagging" incident in July, 2003, which made plausible deniability and circumvention of law absolute necessities. Why else would the now retired Turkish General Koksal Karabay be involved with Black Hawk Security? He has a NATO pedigree and was the representative for the Turkish side in the inquiry following the "bagging" incident.

Then there is the former Turkish governor of Diyarbakir province, Cemil Serhadli. He was even interviewed by PBS before the war began.

Also, there's former MIT undersecretary, Senkal Atasagun. Here's something more on him, courtesy of MIT's English-language site:


He was born in Kars in 1941. He graduated from Galatasaray High School and Grenoble University (in France) Faculty of Political Sciences. He speaks French and English. Following his military service, in 1967 he started to work in the National Intelligence Organization and served at various levels within the directorates of Intelligence and Operations. He is an expert in the field of Counter/ Intelligence. Following his duty as the Deputy Head of Istanbul Field Directorate, he served for two terms in Brussels/Belgium, then was appointed as the Head of Ankara Field Directorate. In 1995, he was appointed as the Head of Operations Directorate, and he was sent to London on an abroad mission. On February 02, 1998, he was appointed as the Undersecretary of the MIT and on June 11, 2005, he retired from his office.


Of course, one can never forget Atasagun's role in coordinating Ocalan's capture with his American counterparts. Atasagun also became a target of one of his MIT cronies, Mehmet Eymur.

It would appear that now Atasagun and his CIA friends are continuing their work through Black Hawk Security.

What about funding? Well, they don't like to talk about that but it would certainly be interesting to track a financial paper trail on them.

See? I told you; not just anyone can build a private military training facility in Silopî.

Saturday, January 27, 2007

PERFIDIOUS KURDS

"Perfidy: 1. Deliberate breach of faith; calculated violation of trust; treachery: 'the fink, whose perfidy was equaled only by his gall' (Gilbert Millstein, New York Times Review of Books November 15, 1981). 2. The act or an instance of treachery."
~ American Heritage Dictionary.


Those damned Kurds! What next?


Many foreign governments have meddled in Iraq’s internal affairs over the years, as the US and Iran are doing today by supporting the Kurds. No government, however, has ever had success in playing the Kurdish card. So says KGB officer Pavel Sudaplatov in his autobiography, Special Tasks. Sudaplatov, for twenty years, was the KGB’s Director of Special Operations Forces and one who also played the Kurdish card, without success.

The Kurds are unworthy partners because they trust no one; they will never compromise on the core issue of an independent Kurdistan; they are willing to destroy several Middle Eastern states on the way to that goal; and, finally, they are ready to sacrifice, without hesitation, the interests of any foreign partner who blocks the way to an independent Kurdistan.

In other words, while President Bush rests easy at night in the belief that the US has earned at least one reliable ally in the Iraqi mess, i.e., the Kurds, he could not be more mistaken.

These pessimistic thoughts on Kurdish perfidy come to mind as Iraq drafts a national petroleum law (see the excellent assessment by Steven Mufson, “Iraq Struggles to Finish Oil Law”, WP). Iraqi adoption of a National Petroleum Law would be a giant Iraqi step away from civil war. President Bush’s faith in a new democratic Iraq would be vindicated. This should be a no-brainer, correct?


Read the rest at The Conservative Voice.

Why should anyone, especially Kurds, be loyal to a country that has consistently and repeatedly betrayed them in the past with devastating effect and massive loss of life each time? Secondly, if anyone ever wanted a prime example of what psychologists refer to as "projection," they need look no farther than this line: "[T]hey are ready to sacrifice, without hesitation, the interests of any foreign partner . . ." Is this not the very thing that the US has done to Kurds? Thirdly, the right-wing ultra-fascist who wrote this screed is really only concerned with the goal of US control of Kurdistan's (and Iraq's) energy resources. See Thursday's post for more on that.

In my book, if the Başûrî leadership is being perfidious . . . BIJÎ!

If, as the title states, the US does attack South Kurdistan for the sake of it's own interests in controlling Middle Eastern oil, well, then the US will finally learn the real meaning of the word "quagmire."

What else are these perfidious Kurds up to? How about providing sanctuary for everyone fleeing the violence in America's Arab Iraq . . . even Christians. Oh, the horror! From Reuters earlier in the week:


Tens of thousands of people have fled Baghdad, the epicentre of violence in Iraq. The United Nations, launching an appeal for aid for Iraqis who have fled their homes or left the country, said this month about one in eight Iraqis is now displaced.

It said the exodus is the largest long-term movement of people in the Middle East since the creation of Israel in 1948.

Many, including non-Kurds, have taken refuge in Kurdistan -- a largely autonomous region in the northern mountains that has been a haven from attacks plaguing other areas since the U.S. invasion of 2003.

But as refugee numbers grow, authorities in Arbil [Hewlêr], the Kurdish capital with a population of about a million, are beginning to feel the strain.

"Over the last two weeks, more than 9,000 people came to Arbil [Hewlêr] escaping from Baghdad as refugees, and they are mainly Sunnis and Christians," Imad Marouf, head of the disaster relief program in Arbil [Hewlêr], part of the Iraqi Red Crescent, told Reuters.

[ . . . ]

In a human rights report on Jan. 16, the United Nations said that of the 1.5 million Assyrian Christians living in Iraq before 2003, half had fled the country and many of the rest were moving to "safe areas" in the north of Iraq.

The main Chaldean Christian college and seminary in Baghdad--closed for months due to threats and violence--relocated to Arbil [Hewlêr] this month, according to Bishop Rabban al-Qas of Arbil [Hewlêr]. Both Christians and Muslims were targets of violence.

"The continuous deterioration of security in Baghdad and the kidnapping of six priests by gunmen forced us to move the these Christian institutes to Arbil [Hewlêr]," he told Reuters.

"The students ... could not attend classes because of the lack of security which made us move to Arbil [Hewlêr]," he said.

Marouf said his office had registered more than 5,000 families -- or around 30,000 people -- who fled to Arbil [Hewlêr] over the last two years.



Let's remember that last year, briefly, everyone was flabbergasted at the fact that the treacherous Kurds were setting an example of religious tolerance in the region, with Neçirvan Barzanî going so far as to say, "I'd rather see a Muslim become Christian than to see him become a radical Muslim."

Actually, I'd rather see them become agnostics or atheists before adopting yet another absurd ideology that has never done any good whatsoever for mankind, but the fact remains that the disobedient, disloyal, evil, majority Muslim Kurds are the only ones in the Middle East to engage in tolerance when the shit is in the process of flying off the fan.

By contrast, IWPR has a recent report on the situation in Mûsil, which is a prime example of how screwed everything becomes when religious people are in charge.

I spoke with some of the parishoners of the main church in Ainkawa two years ago when some of the first Christian refugee families had arrived and were settling in. The parishoners informed me that the Chaldeans of Ainkawa were supporting the Christian refugees themselves, with subsidies from the KRG. At the time, the strain was on, especially given the cost of housing in Ainkawa and Hewlêr, and since the economic situation has deteriorated, the strain must be very great on both the Chaldeans of Ainkawa and the KRG.

This fact begs the question: What are Christians in the West prepared to do for their brothers and sisters who have found refuge in South Kurdistan?

Let me remind everyone, in case you're not aware, but out of the ultra-right wing fascist Western blogosphere, there emanates a daily stream of smug self-righteousness and superiority by Christians and Jews from every blogger at Pajamas Media, Infidel Bloggers' Alliance, Jihad/Dhimmi Watch, and others. Notice too, that these same fascists constantly lend support to their long-time, good NATO ally, Turkey, going so far as to parrot the claim that Turkey is the region's great "Model of Democracy," even while genociding Northern Kurds--something which these fascists also support. Notice, too, that Iraqi Christians and others choose to flee to South Kurdistan rather than to America's "Model of Democracy" in Turkey. . . but that may be because Turkish democrats have developed a habit for whacking Christians in a serious way.

Given these facts, I want to know what the fatmouths on the extreme right are prepared to do for the Christians who have taken refuge in South Kurdistan. In the meantime, I won't hold my breath for an answer because I don't think I look good in purple. Besides, the bloggers mentioned previously are not interested in what becomes of their Christian brothers and sisters anywhere in the world. They're only concerned with propagandizing their phony War on Terror, Inc.

The same goes for the braindead talking heads on fascist TV or radio, who push the propaganda more widely than their counterparts in the blogosphere. If you're in the States, you're familiar with FOX News and Bill O'Reilly. Here's that little monkey, flinging some poo:


Discussing Iraq during the January 24 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show, Bill O'Reilly claimed that "the Sunni and Shia want to kill each other. ... They have fun. This is -- they like this. This is what Allah tells them to do, and that's what they do." O'Reilly then asserted that the "essential mistake of the war" was failing to anticipate that "these people would act like savages, and they are." Later, O'Reilly said that he had not predicted that the Iraqis "were going to act like savages in the aftermath of Saddam [Hussein]," and added: "[N]ow, Iran, we know they're savages." As Media Matters for America has documented [ . . . ], O'Reilly has repeatedly stated his indifference to the deaths of Iraqis and the fate of their country. Recently, O'Reilly claimed that Iraq is not in "civil war," but rather that Muslims are just "doing what they do. They're killing each other. And they're killing Americans"


Ask yourself why O'Reilly did not predict "that the Iraqis 'were going to act like savages in the aftermath of Saddam.'" The answer is because O'Reilly is an idiot. Even Dick Cheney knew the answer to that, two years ago this month:


No, if I were to think back on things that turned out differently than I would have expected, when you talk about Iraq, one of the things I’m still struck by is the devastation, the lasting consequences, if you will, of what happened in ‘91 with respect to the Iraqi population that we found once we toppled Saddam Hussein’s regime and got into Iraq.

The brutality that he used in 1991 to put down the revolt at the time I think just had devastating consequences in terms of the ability of the Iraqi people to recover from his rule. It’s taken a very long time for them to come back, to take control of their own affairs.

I think the hundreds of thousands of people, literally, that were slaughtered during that period of time, including anybody who had the gumption to stand up and challenge him, made the situation tougher than I would have thought.

I would chalk that up as a miscalculation, where I thought things would have recovered more quickly.


And that, boys and girls, is what is known as a Eureka moment, but there has not been, and will not be, any public discussion on this reality because it is irrelevant to the self-righteous. Nor will monkey-man at FOX publicize the situation of Christians and others in South Kurdistan, much less will they act to help because to do so would bolster the Kurdish argument for a democratic and independent Kurdistan. The problem with that, as these people--especially Dick Cheney--well know, is that you cannot control democracy. People may vote the "wrong" way, therefore democracy must be avoided at all costs.

Right now the only thing that matters is to get control on the ground by any means possible in order to get the oil flowing "into the preferred hands," as Noam Chomsky puts it.

Thursday, January 25, 2007

CHOMSKY ON KURDS

"Terrorism turns out to be about the same as counter-terrorism. The main difference is who is the agent of the terrorist violence. If it’s someone we don’t like, it is terrorism. If it's someone we do like, including ourselves, it is counter-terrorism."
~ Noam Chomsky, Addressing the Kurds in Amed.


Noam Chomsky's official website is carrying an interview that Kurdistanî Niwê did with him back in December, and I urgently recommend that all Kurds and friends of Kurds read it through in its entirety. In fact, just to read it through is not good enough; it should be thought about long and hard.

The interview begins by questioning the claim that the US invaded Iraq for its oil, since most of the oil consumed by the US comes from other countries. Chomsky correctly notes that it is not the consumption of oil which was the impetus for war, but the control of oil:


Over 60 years ago, the State Department described the oil reserves of the Gulf as "a stupendous source of strategic power" and "one of the greatest material prizes in world history." Iraq is at the heart of the region, and is itself estimated to have the second largest reserves in the world (after Saudi Arabia). Iraqi sources are also very cheap to extract: no deep sea drilling, extraction from tar sands, etc. Establishment of a US client state in Iraq, and a base for long-term military deployment (as is now being implemented), would greatly enhance US dominance over this "stupendous source of strategic power" and ensure that the wealth from this great "material prize" would flow into the preferred hands.


"Preferred hands" would be US hands, which is also the path being taken for Central Asian energy resources, in an effort to achieve dominance over those resources against the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). The events taking place on the ground in Iraq, and in Kurdistan, right now, have very little if nothing to do with Iraqis or Kurds and everything to do with ensuring the control of energy resources for the future, and in this region, the struggle is against the SCO. What we are witnessing in the region is the beginning of a new Cold War, as one friend of mine recently put it.

Energy resources are going to be used to gain leverage with competing economic blocs, and the US intends to have the upper hand in the game:


Vice-President Dick Cheney, the most influential foreign policy figure in the Bush Administration, observed that control over pipelines can serve as a "tool of intimidation." He was referring of course to control by others, but understands perfectly well that the same is true of US control.


In the same way, Kurdish oil resources can be used by Kurds as a "tool of intimidation" against the US, which has betrayed Kurds consistently at every opportunity. The use of energy resources to intimidate is the idea which causes Condoleeza Rice to state that "Kurds do not have the right over oil in their areas," as recently reported by KurdishMedia. It is also the reason that Turkish politicians vilify Osman Baydemir when he says that local oil and hydroenergy resources should be administered locally. Kurds cannot be permitted to administer or have right of authority over their own resources by the great powers, or even by two-bit powers in the case of Turkey, because authority over these resources is empowerment.

Chomsky warns repeatedly to ignore the US claim of "spreading democracy," because it is mere political rhetoric with no basis in reality, and he refers to governmental use of phrases about "spreading democracy" as "routine and meaningless." Instead of actual concern for the global state of democracy, the democracy rhetoric is used to anaesthetize the victim into accepting US machinations to control resources as "tool[s] of intimidation", just as it's used to anaesthetize the American public into accepting policies that result in the brutalization of indigenous overseas populations (like Kurds) in the name of the American people. An honest discussion of these matters never enters public discourse in the US, or the West in general:


These matters, though obvious, are largely excluded from Western discourse. Doctrinal managers would like us to believe that the US and UK would have "liberated" Iraq even if its major exports were lettuce and pickles and the major energy resources of the world were in the South Pacific. It takes really impressive discipline "not to see" the obvious.




The fact that such "spreading democracy" phrases are "routine and meaningless" should be as clear as crystal to Kurds, because if the US were serious about the state of democracy elsewhere, why hasn't it done anything to encourage democracy in Turkey? Why the liberal use of the phrase (or any of its variations) that reminds us what a "model of democracy" Turkey is for the region?


The truth of the matter is recognized by the most prominent scholar/advocates of "democracy promotion." The most respected of them is Thomas Carothers, head of the Democracy and Law project of the Carnegie Endowment, who describes himself as a neo-Reaganite. He writes in part from an insider's perspective, having served in Reagan's State Department programs of "democracy enhancement." He is an honest scholar, and recognizes that these programs were a failure, in fact, a highly systematic failure. In the regions where US influence was least, there was progress in democracy, despite strenuous efforts of the Reagan administration to prevent it. The worst record was in the regions where the US had the most influence. He also explains the reasons: Washington would permit only "top-down forms" of democracy in which traditional elites, linked to the US, would retain power in deeply undemocratic societies.

[ . . . ]

The record in Iraq follows the pattern very closely. There is a mountain of evidence supporting Carothers's conclusion, in the Middle East and elsewhere. . . . The only evidence supporting the belief in the "messianic mission" is the rhetoric of leaders. It takes real discipline to jump on the bandwagon, as is routinely done in deeply indoctrinated Western societies. These delusions are safe enough for the powerful. For the victims to succumb to them has always led to disaster, as Kurds should not have to be reminded.



Chomsky believes that peace will not be achieved in the region without a solution to the Kurdish situation, a fact which Kurds have known for some time:


My own view has always been that there should be an independent Kurdistan, which would include northern Iraq and large parts of neighboring countries. I have spoken about that in the US, as you mention, but more importantly in Diyarbakir, several times. I do not think it is likely to happen in the foreseeable future. It is conceivable, however, that a form of federalism might develop in the region, which would permit considerable autonomy. I think that is a sensible outcome in most of the world, particularly in the complex West Asian region, but in Europe as well, where there are encouraging moves in that direction. I doubt, frankly, that Iraqi Kurdistan would be viable, surrounded by hostile neighbors, and with limited access even to the Iraqi market and its resources and outlet to the sea -- limited, of course, by the machinations of British imperialism, but still at least something.


The War on Terror is met with skepticism by Chomsky, and the notion of dividing the world into a terrorist camp and a contra-terrorist camp is characterized as propaganda, because jihadi terrorism has been around for several decades and has even proved useful for the US and the West at times. Chomsky gives examples from history, stretching geographically from Central America to Kosovo, and from Kuwait to Pakistan and Afghanistan. He has some ideas on how to fight terrorism, but notes that a serious fight against terrorism is not the priority of the American administration, and I suspect that the reason it isn't a priority is because, in addition to being profitable for the war industry, the maintenance of low-level conflicts in certain regions does much to mask the struggle for control of energy resources.

All in all, it's an excellent read and compresses a lot of Chomsky's thinking into a brief introduction.

Yesterday, KurdishMedia carried an article on MIT activity in Kerkuk. Now, this is something that isn't technically "news" since we all know that MIT has been active there since 2003--remember the bagging incident? However, what is new is that a KDP chief in Kerkuk has criticized Kurdish news media for not bringing to light the fact that the violence in Kerkuk and surrounding area is aimed at Kurds and not Turkmen as the Turkish Propaganda Ministry would have everyone believe.

Hîwa is the one who brought this to my attention and his comments to me make me think that as long as Kurdish news media ignores pointing the finger at MIT, or any other Turkish intelligence organization, this news will remain categorized as "rumor." For example, no matter how many eye-witnesses testify to the events of the Helebçe atrocity, no matter how many documents and audio tapes are available as proofs, no matter that there is an ongoing Anfal trial, there are still those who insist against all the evidence that the Saddam regime did not commit these atrocities. Investigative journalists in South Kurdistan need to start digging the dirt on Turkish involvement in the Kerkuk violence and they need to start publishing the information far and wide.

By the way, mentioning both Hîwa and the Anfal trial reminds me that Hîwa has posted something on the trial the other day, in which he wonders if anyone even knows that a trial is going on. This is exactly what all of us were worried about. While the Americans were crowing over the dubious victory they thought the Saddam execution would give them, and the Shi'a were dancing in the streets in Michigan, we knew that the memory of hundreds of thousands of Kurds were really being hanged.

And now, we are proved correct.

So, there you have it; the Iraqis and Americans have achieved their desires on the subject of Saddam's slaughter of 182,000 Kurds. Let us watch now and see how quickly the neocons start howling the Pelletiere/US Army War College lie that Iran gassed the Başûrî, as they are hot to use Iraq--and Kurdistan--as the launch pad for their next war . . . on Iran.

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

MISSING POLITICIANS, STATE'S ASSASSINS, AND RESPONSIBILITY

"A state always calls itself fatherland when it is ready for murder."
~ Friedrich Durenmatt.


Remember over the weekend, how everyone suddenly became brothers over Hrant Dink's murder? Well, I guess no one passed the word to any of Turkey's bigshot politicians, because not a single one of them bothered to show up at Dink's funeral yesterday. Take a look at TDN:


As tens of thousands of people in the streets and millions in their homes were bidding farewell to murdered journalist Hrant Dink, nearly all of the country's leading politicians were conspicuous only for their absence.


Who had better things to do? Turkish president Ahmet Necdet Sezer, who doesn't "do" funerals on some kind of principle known only to him. Besides, he had better things to do with the Polish president and the Parliament speaker of Turkish-occupied Cyprus. Who else was missing? Parliament speaker Bulent Arinc, Prime Minister Erdogan, and Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul. Apparently they did send the Interior Minister, and that must have served a two-fold purpose: to make sure no more Deep State assassins showed up to further damage Turkey's international image by blowing away a few more "undesirables," and to take notes on anyone displaying too much "brotherhood," so that they could receive a discreet warning later. . . like a bullet in the mail from a non-existent return address.

It's kind of odd, isn't it? In the US, the Department of the Interior is in charge of stuff like national parks, water resources, rocks, trees; while in Turkey, the Interior Ministry is in charge of stuff like the state's assassins. Does anyone remember Yesil aka Ahmet Demir aka Mahmut Yildirim or Abdullah Catli? They are (or were, in the case of Catli) notorious state assassins. Who was in charge of them? Well, at the time of Susurluk, when we came closest to getting a glimpse of where all the tentacles of the Deep State might lead, Mehmet Agar was in charge of them. He was the Interior Minister in Ciller's government.

Check out this headline: "Hrant's funeral brought Armenian and Turkish officials together". Then TNA goes on to mention absolutely nothing about any officials other than the Armenian Patriarch of Turkey. For that thoroughly deceptive headline, TNA gets the gold star for today's biggest media prevarication.

More from the Feeding-the-Monster Department: The Association of Literary Translators in Turkey has issued a statement on the question of responsibility of the murder of Hrant Dink:


The greatest share of responsibility rests on all institutions of state which still regard ideas and the expressions of ideas as “dangerous”, and which have long accustomed to exercising “violence” through judicial threats towards any writer, caricaturist, thinker, journalist, publisher, translator, NGO activist or whoever questions the state’s own “official” views on anything. The responsibility rests on the state’s legislative, executive and judiciary constituents and within its parliament and within its opposition. The very of act judging someone merely because he or she argued for or against an opinion is itself an act of violence that encourages some “civil” know-it-alls to exercise violence and literal “terror” on any intellectual saying something contrary to the received wisdom.

The second big responsibility lies within the mainstream media that does not fulfill its duty of monitoring the administrators of the state on behalf of the public or its duty of making visible the systematic pressures and violations of rights which hover above all freedoms in general and above the freedom of expression in particular, and thereby cautioning the public of these misdemeanors. Instead, this mainstream media has done everything to the best of its abilities in order to justify the pressure exerted on those using their inalienable rights, and now it is shedding crocodile tears. The media see the demands for freedom and rights merely as “impositions from the EU”. They fail to stress that freedoms as such are necessary to ensure our own right to live in decency regardless of EU membership. Responsibility also goes to any faction that readily labels anybody attempting to open up any kind of debate on the EU, or discuss issues concerning Kurds and Armenians as “sellout puppets”, “traitors”, “instruments of imperialists”, or “agents” and then terrorize them. All of them are responsible for the enormous psychological torture and threats to which Hrant Dink has recently been subjected to, and as a result of which he described his predicament as "the dove skittishness of my soul." Indeed, we are all responsible, for we were unable to support him sufficiently to help him speak freely without fearing for his life.


A brilliant piece of writing, especially since many translators have also been charged under Article 301. The ones that come to mind immediately on that score are Fatih Tas, his publishing house, Aram, along with a number of Aram's editors and translators. In particular is their work on Noam Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent and John Tirman's Spoils of War, but these are not the only ones to find themselves charged with "insulting Turkishness" or some other Article 301-sanctioned stupidity.

A third suspect has been picked up in connection with the murder, a guy going by the name of Erhan T. Again from TDN:


Investigating a third layer of involvement in the Hrant Dink murder, a new brother, Elazığ-born Erhan T. was arrested in Trabzon two days ago and brought to Istanbul yesterday, daily Hürriyet reported. By snatching Erhan T. the police reached the third circle of the investigation, it was reported. Together with suspected murderer Ogün Samast and Yasin Hayal - the brother who had given the gun to Samast according to his police confession - Erhan T. is thought to be the third person of the link.

[ . . . ]

Police sources said that Erhan T. is also suspected to be behind the murder of Italian Priest Santoro in Trabzon in 2004. Police are investigating the similarities between the Dink case and the Santoro murder, they said.


According to TDN, Yasin Hayal was the snitch that led Turkish police to pick up Erhan T. Additionally, people are starting to notice that Hayal did less than a year's time for bombing a McDonald's in Trabzon a couple of years ago. On the surface it may look inconsistent that someone carrying out a terrorist act is given a sentence of less than a year by a state that prides itself on its gung-ho attitude to the global War on Terror, Inc., but this kind of thing is not a serious crime in Turkey, even if you do threaten to blow up a Russian embassy or few banks once you get out of the big house. A serious crime in Turkey consists of writing things like, oh, I don't know . . . "The Armenians were genocided," or "Kurds suffer repression."

In the same report, long-time Deep State murderer Veli Kucuk is turning a bit Erdogan-ish, by threatening to sue anyone--particularly Dink's lawyer, Erdal Dogan--who claims that Kucuk threatened Dink. How are we supposed to read that with a straight face when we know it's coming from the same guy who invented his own "state secrets' privilege," thereby disregarding the Susurluk trial altogether. If anyone else, in any other place but Turkey, decided to dis a court on so much as a traffic violation, they'd be held in contempt by the presiding judge, fined, and probably spend at least a few nights in jail. Not so in Turkey, at least not with the Deep State's murderers, that is.

Equally amusing and enlightening is what the lawyer, Dogan, says: "Dink had been receiving threats for two-and-a-half years. The name that worried him most was Veli Küçük. But this is not an an aspersion (misleading charge meant to harm his reputation)."

Geeeeeezzz . . . I didn't think it was possible to harm the reputation of a bastard like Kucuk. Maybe that's what Dogan meant.

Hehehe . . . funny how close in sound the name Küçük is to the word kûçik, but I'm not going to press that issue too much; it's an insult to dogs.

Monday, January 22, 2007

JITEM AND HRANT DINK


"They were both in the system and in the file. What should really be asked is why they [Kucuk and Agar] were not captured. If you are going to get a result on Susurluk they should be brought on the agenda".
~
Fikri Saglar.


UPDATE:
The media's in a frenzy with Samast's adolescent remark that he murdered Dink because Dink said "Turkish blood is dirty," and I guess everyone will eat that up too, because a Turkish kangaroo court convicted him of it, right? Wrong. For the record, here's an explanation of what Dink really said:


It is ironic that Dink got into trouble for suggesting to diaspora Armenians that it was time to rid themselves of their rage against the Turks. "Armenians, especially of the diaspora, tend to have a problem associated with the role of other that the Turk has played in forming the Armenian identity", Dink says. "There is a certain history. A trauma. The Turk has become such a source of pain that it "poisons the Armenian blood", as the Anatolian saying goes. In my article, I was addressing the Armenian world and saying: "There are two ways of getting rid of this poison. One way is for the Turks to empathise with you, and take action to reduce your trauma. At the moment this seems unlikely. The second way is for you to rid yourself of it yourself. Turn your attention towards the state of Armenia and replace the poisoned blood associated with the Turk, with fresh blood associated with Armenia.'


It was the Turkish media that hyped the lie about Turkish blood being dirty, and that twisting of truth in order to incite the Turkish population and create an atmosphere which accepts assassination as a legitimate means of silencing "The Other" is the feeding of the monster that Ismet Berkan referred to in his column in Radikal over the weekend. The Turkish media was an accessory to the crime of the assassination attempt on Akin Birdal years ago and it is an accessory to the murder of Hrant Dink now.

In other news from the rabbit hole . . . According to Hrant Dink's brother, Orhan Dink, notorious JITEM member Veli Kucuk made an appearance at one of Hrant's trials. The mere appearance of a filthy JITEM vermin like Kucuk is enough to send a message--a message Hrant Dink clearly understood:


Orhan Dink told reporters that his brother told him he became worried when Veli Küçük, a prominent member of Turkey’s controversial Jandarma İstihbarat ve Terörle Mücadele (Gendarme Intelligence and Counter Terrorism organization), the JITEM, came to the trial and that the affair was “turning into a dangerous one”.

Hrand Dink said, ‘I am being pointed at as the target’, Orhan Dink told reporters.

Orhan Dink said that Küçük never threatened his brother directly.

“After Küçük came, we suspected that the bullet might have followed, and it did. … We were speaking within the family… What can we do? Should we leave [the country] or should we stay? Sometimes we would decide to leave. But then we would say that this nation is ours.”, Orhan Dink said. He added, “I wish they killed us all. We are no longer doves, we are now falcons. We love the people of Turkey. We will not let a bunch of people to take over. And we are not considering to leave any more. We gave our sacrifice. In order to stay, we can give more. We consider leaving as a treason against our brother.”


To give this some context, let's do a little review:

Filthy JITEM vermin Kucuk was involved with Susurluk, too, a minor detail that was noted in the wake of the Council of State attack, from Bianet:


Possible connections between the armed attack on Turkey's State Council during which one judge was killed and four others were wounded surfaced after relations were uncovered linking one of the suspects, retired officer Muzaffer Tekin, to retired general Veli Kucuk who was named in the Susurluk File.

Kucuk, who was a Brigadier General during the period where the Susurluk relations flourished, had refused to testify before the Parliament Investigation Commission on Susurluk.

But there are two other links in the Susurluk folder that have so far, in the last connection with the State Council attack, not been mentioned.

Mehmet Agar, politician-turned-policeman who not only chairs the True Path Party in the following years but serves directly in all operations as Turkey's National Police Chief in the Susurluk buildup. And the highest level security organ in the Turkish system: The National Security Council (NCS) which journalist Ismet Berkan identified as the supreme structure "that authorised the irregular war gang that was revealed with Susurluk".

On Kucuk and Agar, Saglar said "Both of them were in the operations. One of them from JITEM (Gendarme Intelligence) and the other as the Police General Director" and argued that Agar's becoming chairman of the True Path Party (DYP) "does not erase from history what he has done."

"They were both in the system and in the file. What should really be asked is why they [Kucuk and Agar] were not captured. If you are going to get a result on Susurluk they should be brought on the agenda".


[Note: The Mehmet Agar mentioned in connection with Deep State is the same Mehmet Agar who's now running in the Turkish election campaigns for the DYP.]

More, from DozaMe:


What Mr Elkatmis, as the Chair of the Susurluk Investigation Commission, has said still goes without notice. He said in a manner of questioning our “bloody history ?:

“There are three bases to the [organized] gang. First is the police, second is the [state] bureaucrats and third is the military. We can question the police and some of bureaucrats, but we cannot question the military. Ibrahim Sahin [police officer involved in Susurluk] was accused of setting up an illegal gang based on his photographs with Abdullah Catli [Turkey’s most wanted assassin killed in Susurluk crash]. We also have documents proving that Brigadier General Veli Kucuk made several telephone calls to Abdullah Catli. Why weren’t these documents accepted as evidence and there has not been an investigation against Veli Kucuk. Who ever finds him/herself in a difficult situation can claim that it is national security and would not turn up to give a statement in a court. Only if some people speak in Turkey can we get to the bottom of the investigation ?. . .

Ibrahim Sahin was sentenced to 6 years imprisonment, but Brigadier General Veli Kucuk was promoted to Major General in August, the same year.


Yet more, from TNA:


Hanefi Avci, who was then the police intelligence department acting head and now is Edirne police chief, best described the Susurluk connections. In his testimony at the parliamentary commission probing the Susurluk scandal, he claimed that there was an "illegal" organization established within the state to fight terrorism. He also said this organization then became a gang, which was established within the MIT, the police and Gendarmerie Intelligence (JITEM). Mehmet Agar, Korkut Eken, Ibrahim Sahin from the police, Mehmet Eymur, Duran Firat and Kasif Binbasi from the MIT and Lt. Col. Veli Kucuk from JITEM were in this organization and involved in numerous illegal actions under the leadership of Ahmet Cem Ersever, who was later killed by Kemal Uzuner (a.k.a Cubuklu), a driver working at JITEM, said Avci.


[Note: Mehmet Eymur is the bastard who was in charge of MIT's "counter-terrorism" department. He's been in "exile" in the US for some time, apparently after having some kind of trouble with the really big bastards behind the Deep State. Word on the street now is that he's been given some kind of reprieve, and that he's assisting Mehmet Agar in his campaign. Why is the United States protecting mass murderers like Mehmet Eymur? Inquiring minds want to know.]



Today, according to Firat News, through TNA, it looks like Kucuk is expanding his operations . . . into Azerbaijan:


Speculations regarding the murder of Dink, an Armenian-origin Turkish journalist, have been growing, raising further questions, while the media has been looking into the killer's possible link with a notorious ex-general, Kucuk. However, photos released by a pro-PKK media organ, the Firat News Agency, formerly the Mesopotamia News Agency, showed Kucuk with some other important figures.

Kucuk's name entered into Dink's murder investigation when the late writer's lawyers told officials that Kucuk had threatened Dink. They also also said that Ogun Samast, who confessed to the murder, was threatened by circles close to Kucuk.

In a photo taken two years ago Kucuk was seen with gunman Arslan at the Azerbaijan Congress held in Stockholm. After the bloody Council of State attack, Kucuk said he didn't knew Arslan. He also said after Dink's murder that he had no connection with the murder or suspect.

In another photo, Kucuk was seen with Muzaffer Tekin, said to be the mastermind of both the Council of State and daily Cumhuriyet attacks, and Association of Lawyers' Union head Kemal Kerincsiz, a high-profile ultranationalist figure known for filing complaints against writers and journalists, including Dink.

[ . . . ]

Furthermore, the news agency claimed that Kucuk was organizing nationalist circles in Azerbaijan and established a murder network against Armenians. The agency said it based this claim on information obtained in 2001 from Turan A., the nephew of Azerbaijan's then Interior Minister Siyavuz Mustafa . The news also accused Turkey's Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) of illegally training soldiers with Kucuk in Azerbaijan.


The Firat News article can be viewed here. It contains a link near the bottom to Mesopotamian News, which carries the photos.

So what's the deal with Kucuk and Azerbaijan? Well, the claim is that Yasin Hayal, Ogun Samast's handler, learned how to make bombs with Chechen militants in Azerbaijan. See Sunday's post for more on that, and remember, Azerbaijan is one of America's new best buddies. Ken Silverstein at Harper's has done some digging in that dirt. Take a look at what he unearthed here and here to see how badly all of DC is sucking up to the Baku regime, and why. I guess these DC movers-and-shakers will look the other way at a little Turkish ultra-nationalist terror crossing the border, as long as they're only targeting an Armenian in Istanbul.

In the meantime, certain TBMM deputies have begun bitching about why Kucuk doesn't have any state protection--see the TNA article for that. In my opinion, Kucuk should be sent to Beytussebap to head up the JITEM office there, so that he can experience the same Kurdish hospitality the last JITEM chief enjoyed last September.

COMING TO TERMS WITH THE PAST

"I explicitly showed in my book that the attitude of the founder of Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal, on the events of 1915 is just the opposite of the denialist attitudes of current Turkish politics. His viewpoint toward the Armenian genocide has now been deliberately forgotten and deleted from Turkish collective memory."
~ Taner Akçam, The Minnesota Daily.


Dr. Taner Akçam on Turkey and the Armenian Genocide, Part I





Part II




Part III




Part IV




Part V