Witness tells court how evidence destroyed at military headquarters

Pvt. Cüneyt Alkan, who worked at the Information Support Unit as an aide to Gen. Mustafa Bakıcı, testified to the İstanbul 13th High Criminal Court as a witness at the 203rd hearing of the trial of Ergenekon, a shadowy crime network that has alleged links within the state and is suspected of plotting to topple the government.

An İstanbul court issued an arrest warrant for Bakıcı in 2011 as part of a probe regarding the establishment of several websites that allegedly ran propaganda campaigns against the government on behalf of the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK). He fled to Russia to avoid arrest, according to media claims.

At the hearing Alkan described how after the action plan hit the papers, Col. Dursun Çiçek, who undersigned the action plan, requested to meet with Bakıcı, but before this meeting, the document shredding operation had commenced. Alkan said they gathered all the civil servants who worked at the unit and told them that documents were to be destroyed.

Alkan told the court that they destroyed documents all night and that four to five vehicles were loaded up after the destruction. The documents were shredded in an allocated space at the General Staff -- and most of the documents were brought by Col. Nuri Yıldırım, he said.

Alkan also noted that the destruction of documents began after the release of Çiçek from prison in 2009. Çiçek was later rearrested.

Çiçek was arrested twice, first in July and then in November in 2009, for suspected links to a terrorist organization but was released after brief detentions in jail. The colonel is believed to be key to exposing the pro-coup junta within the armed forces. The colonel is accused of working to overthrow the government as well as membership in a terrorist organization.

Alkan said his superiors asked him to follow the news about Çiçek after the colonel's re-arrest and inform them on the developments. He also said he received threats from a colonel to keep all of what happened at the military headquarters secret, otherwise it would take a long time for him to be discharged from the military.