Today’s Zaman, Turkey
May 15 2010
Judges in missionary murders case request Cage Plan evidence files
German Ambassador to Turkey Eckart Cuntz was in Malatya to attend the
trial into the assassination of journalist Hrant Dink.
The judges presiding over the trial over the murder of three Christian
missionaries in 2007 have requested the complete evidence file in the
investigation into the Cage Action Plan ahead of a decision over
whether to merge the two cases.
The panel of judges convened yesterday for the 26th hearing in the
trial over the killing of three men working at the Zirve Publishing
House in Malatya on April 18, 2007. In the previous hearing the panel
of judges had said it would rule on whether to combine the files
connected to the Cage Action Plan — detailing secret plans by a unit
within the military to attack and intimidate non-Muslims — with the
ongoing trial over the Malatya murders. The decision is a critical
one, as the lawyers representing the victims’ families have
continually insisted that the murder of the three Christians was not a
simple hate crime but something much deeper. The Cage Action Plan case
indictment has already been added to the Malatya case file, and
yesterday the panel of judges decided to request that the entire Cage
Action Plan case evidence file be sent by the Ä°stanbul 12th High
Criminal Court to the Malatya 3rd High Criminal Court. Following the
review of this evidence the Malatya judges will decide whether the two
cases should be merged.
Observers have drawn a connection — potentially supported by the data
contained within the Cage Plan investigation’s evidence files —
between the murders of the Christians and the 2007 discovery of a
cache of weapons that prompted the beginning of Turkey’s trial of the
century, involving a criminal formation known as Ergenekon nestled
deep within the state that planned a number of acts to create the
preconditions for a military coup d’état — actions that might have
gone so far as assassinating three Christian missionaries.
The judges also accepted a request from the prosecution that the
Malatya court request information on the prison entry date and charges
against Erhan Ã-zel, currently held in Amasya and an eyewitness in the
trial over the assassination of Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant
Dink. The court said it would consider whether to request the
transcript of Ã-zel’s testimony to the Ä°stanbul court and whether to
call him to testify as a witness in Malatya as well.
The European Union has been following developments surrounding Dink’s
assassination, the Malatya murders and the Cage Action Plan
investigation very closely. In the courtroom yesterday attending the
trial proceedings were Susanne Geske, the wife of the murdered German
national, and German Ambassador to Turkey Eckart Cuntz. The next
hearing in the Malatya case has been scheduled for June 25.
In April 2007, Christians Necati Aydın (35), UÄ?ur Yüksel and German
national Tilmann Ekkehart Geske (46) were tied to their chairs,
stabbed and tortured at the Zirve Publishing House before their
throats were slit. The publishing house they worked for printed Bibles
and Christian literature. Among the suspects, Salih Güler, Cuma
Ã-zdemir, Hamit Ã?eker and Abuzer Yıldırım, were caught at the crime
scene and immediately taken into custody, while Emre Günaydın jumped
from a third-story window while attempting to escape from the police
and was taken into custody on a court order after a hospital stay. A
total of nine men have been charged in connection with the murders,
and seven of them are in jail.
15 May 2010, Saturday
TODAY’S ZAMAN WITH WIRES Ä°STANBUL