In recent days, two Turkish business jets have visited the capital of Armenia, and they are connected with Turkish special services and state bodies.
Sputnik Armenia, in particular, paid attention to the fact that on March 8, the Gulfstream G-IV(SP) business jet of the Turkish Sierra Aviation company made a flight on the Yerevan-Ankara route. Social media users involved in flight tracking and OSINT (intelligence based on open sources) have linked this plane to Turkish special services.
The geography of the flights also indicates that the plane was hardly used for normal commercial purposes. In particular, the aircraft regularly flies to the countries of the Middle East (Oman, UAE, Saudi Arabia) and Africa (Libya, Egypt, Sudan).
Moreover, it was once used for the flight of Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama.
Considering the interesting history of the flights, we inquired from the Foreign Ministry whether any Turkish delegation visited Yerevan. We were told that there were no guests from the Foreign Ministry.
Sputnik Armenia also sent a request to the RA Foreign Intelligence Service, asking: 1) Was it an intelligence visit by Turkish representatives, 2) if not, was the flight private?
They did not answer our questions clearly from the Armenian National Security Service, instead they referred in detail to the specifics of their activities.
In particular, they noted that “due to the problems faced by the service and the specifics of its activity, the service is guided by the strict observance of the principle of confidentiality defined by the law and has objectively adopted a policy of ensuring the lowest possible level of public discussion about the service’s activities.”
Such an approach, as noted in the special service, is intended to ensure not only the normal work of the National Intelligence Service within the framework of the implementation of foreign intelligence activities, but also to prevent possible security risks for the state and society as a result of the disclosure of information outside the limits of admissibility.
“Taking into account the above, we inform you that it is not considered appropriate to provide information implying a positive or negative answer to both the 1st and 2nd questions by the service,” said the answer.
It should be noted that we had already sent the request to the FSA when the second similar flight was noticed in the sky of Yerevan.
This time the Dassault Falcon 7X plane left Yerevan for Istanbul.
This aircraft belongs to the Zafer Air company, which also connects with “sensitive” flights in the Middle East and Africa.
It is noteworthy that the first aircraft, Gulfstream G-IV(SP), was previously also in the fleet of Zafer Air.
Thus, if we assume that a Turkish delegation arrived in Armenia, then by comparing the data, we can assume that the technical group arrived on the first flight, and the delegation of direct negotiators on the second.
Nevertheless, in the absence of official information, it is not possible to make definite statements about the purpose of the flight and the passengers.
Let’s remind that since March 11, Turkish Airlines has started to operate flights on the Istanbul-Yerevan-Istanbul route.
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