Servet Günerigök
November 30, 2015•Update: December 01, 2015
ISTANBUL
A court in Istanbul has ordered the arrest of three senior army officers, including two generals on charges of espionage and leading a terrorist group in a case involving the search of Turkish intelligence trucks in 2014.
The court made the ruling on Sunday.
General Hamza Celepoglu was accused of forming and leading an armed terrorist organization and of trying to overthrow the Turkish government. General Ibrahim Aydin and a retired colonel, Burhanettin Cihangiroglu, were accused of forming and leading an armed terrorist organization as well as spying and trying to oust the Turkish government, according to Istanbul prosecutor Irfan Fidan.
The three suspects were called to an Istanbul courthouse on Saturday as part of an investigation involving the search of trucks belonging to the Turkish intelligence (MIT) in 2014.
In January of that year, several trucks were stopped by the local gendarmerie in southern Adana and Hatay provinces on the grounds that they were loaded with ammunition, despite a national security law forbidding such a search.
Turkish Interior Ministry had said at the time that the trucks, which were reportedly carrying arms into northern Syria, were in reality conveying humanitarian aid to the Turkmen community in the war-torn country.
On Thursday, two prominent journalists were also arrested for publishing stories in their daily about the trucks. Can Dundar, editor-in-chief of newspaper Cumhuriyet, and the daily’s Ankara bureau chief, Erdem Gul, were accused of espionage and of aiding an armed group.
