Ankara Specially Authorized Prosecutor Mustafa Bilgili has requested the list in order to determine which prosecutors and judges were present at meetings organized by generals at the General Staff in Ankara. After determining the names of the attendees, the judges and prosecutors who went to the meetings will be summoned to testify on the content of the meetings. The primary motive behind the investigation is to examine the court decisions during the Feb. 28 period as a large number of people think that most court rulings on conservative organizations, people, military officers, university professors, students and politicians were made based on political motives. As accusations and suspicions grow, the judges and prosecutors will probably face charges of “abusing their authority and power” and eliminating the “constitutional principle of separation of powers” in a democratic system by taking orders from generals, the Star daily noted on Thursday. In this regard, the office of the Ankara chief prosecutor intends to take the testimonies of judges and prosecutors who attended those meetings to reveal the motives and objectives of the meetings and to shed light on whether the decisions taken during the meetings had an impact on some court cases in that period.
According to sources in Ankara, the same daily noted, the prosecutor will ask the judges and prosecutors why they went to those meetings and what kind of topics were discussed there. More importantly, the prosecutor will ask whether the generals ordered them to launch any investigations into figures or organizations that did not share the same political stance.
The Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) issued a memorandum on Feb. 28, 1997 vehemently criticizing the government led by the Islamist Welfare Party (RP) and claimed that the government failed to take necessary measures to fight what the army called “reactionaryism.” Following threats by the General Staff, the government resigned several months later. The decisions, which were taken at the National Security Council (MGK) meeting on Feb. 28 and signed by Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan, were interpreted as merely tarnishing the essence of democracy by the military.
During the meetings, which were held in the Orbay Hall at General Staff headquarters, retired Gen. Çetin Saner, the head of military intelligence at the time, and Gen. Fevzi Türkeri, head of the counterintelligence unit and General Staff security department head, told prosecutors and judges to firstly consider the importance of the secular republic in court cases. The objectivity and legal principles in court cases were to be subordinated to the political goals of the secular establishment.
“There are threats to the republic and its basic principles. The survival of secularism and the republic is in question. You should take this into consideration when you hand down a verdict in court cases. You are the one who will protect secularism and the republic. Never show tolerance to those who tarnish the essence of secularism,” the generals said in one of the meetings, the Star daily noted. Bilgili, who oversees the investigation into the Feb. 28 coup, will take the testimonies of the top military officials of the time including the former Chief of General Staff retired Gen. İsmail Hakkı Karadayı, retired Gen. Çevik Bir and others, if he deems it necessary.
