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Lawyers request merger of missionary murder case with Ergenekon
Lawyers for the Zirve publishing house victims met with Ergenekon prosecutor Zekeriya Öz on Monday. After a nearly two-hour meeting, lawyer Orhan Kemal Cengiz talked to members of the press in front of an İstanbul courthouse, saying: “Although there is no solid evidence yet, Mr. Öz feels the way we do. We think the Malatya murders are linked to the Cage plan,” he said, referring to a recently revealed military document titled the Cage Operation Action Plan, which plotted a series of assassinations of non-Muslims.
However, the prosecutors conducting the Ergenekon probe have a heavy workload, he noted. Cengiz said an individually appointed prosecutor should study the murder files and establish the corresponding points in the Ergenekon and Malatya cases and then notify prosecutors.
The lawyers yesterday submitted a five-page petition for a merger of the two cases.
A prosecutor in the case involving the murder of three Christians in Malatya on April 18, 2007 claimed in the 23rd hearing of the Zirve murder trial in late December that an İstanbul court has established a connection between that event and the 2007 discovery of a cache of weapons that prompted the beginning of the biggest trial of the century in Turkey. Prosecutor Özkan Yücel stated that his prosecutorial team believed that there was a connection between his case and Ergenekon. Yücel asserted that a report prepared by İstanbul special prosecutors contains evidence linking the two cases.
The report concerns an ongoing classified investigation into former Malatya Gendarmerie Regiment Commander Col. Mehmet Ülger and two special sergeants. Yücel said he had asked the court to send an inquiry to the İstanbul Chief State Prosecutor’s Office over whether weapons found buried underground or in other hidden caches thus far in the Ergenekon probe were in any way connected to the murders of the Christian missionaries.
Yücel also noted that while his team of prosecutors was awaiting the results of an investigation into the recently unearthed Cage Operation Action Plan, allegedly prepared by Ergenekon, they had learned that as part of the investigation into Ülger, a report drafted by an İstanbul prosecutor contained information proving a connection between Ergenekon and the Malatya murders. However, he said they couldn’t access the file at the time since the file was classified.
The next hearing in the Zirve case will be held on Feb. 19.
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