Ergenekon convict released, case unraveling

TURKEY - In Brief 09 Dec 2013 by Atilla Yesilada

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Ergenekon convict, journalist and CHP Izmir deputy Mr. Mustafa Balbay was released from an Ankara correctional facility today, as a lower court agreed with the Constitutional Court that his right to a free and fair trial had been violated. In the last Weekly Tracker I had bet against his release, because even two pieces of specific legislation in the parliament could not sway the same court to release him and 7 other incarcerated sitting deputies before. Mr. Balbay’s case will serve as precedent for hundreds of Ergenekon-Sledgehammer coup plot convicts. A new trial may take at least another 5 years, if not more. I think he was set free largely because the AKP-Gulen Church alliance is disintegrating and neither party wishes to be left behind holding the bag for the most outrageous kangaroo trial of the 21st century. A recent leak of an authentic National Security Council 2004 resolution revealed that the-then highest policy making body of the state had ordered all agencies to persecute an all-out campaign against Islamists. This means that dozens of Ergenekon-Sledgehammer convicts including former military chief of staff Gen Basbug were simply following NSC orders when they allowed or instructed their underlings to stage black-ops against Islamic sects. I think the psychological blow to the conservative community will be devastating. For 7 years—as long as the combined trials lasted—this large majority believed that the secularist powers, namely the military and its allies in the media and business community conspired to oppress the devout. The whole narrative now turns out to be fabricated.