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| Fethullah Gulen |
The minutes of the recent meeting between PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan and the BDP deputies were leaked to the press on Thursday, in what has been interpreted as an apparent move to sabotage the positive atmosphere around Turkey's latest efforts to end the decades-long conflict that has engulfed the country's Southeast.
In the minutes, which were made public by the Milliyet daily on Thursday, Öcalan leveled accusations against Gülen, portraying the Islamic scholar as an agent of the US and Turkish counterterrorism department.
According to the minutes, Öcalan targeted Gülen and accused a volunteer-based civic movement named after him of conspiring against the government and the National Intelligence Organization (MİT), despite the fact that Gülen was among the first figures who voiced support for the government's peace talks.
Gülen’s lawyer dismissed such claims as baseless and a product of fabrication.
“These unfair and baseless claims are nothing but imagination and the fabrication of those whose names were reportedly found in the leaked reports in the press,” Nurullah Albayrak, Gülen’s lawyer, said in a statement.
Albayrak cast doubts over the leaked İmralı logs, citing his caution over whether the those parts about Gülen were really discussed in the İmralı meeting or not. He said claims that Gülen had infiltrated the Nur movement (a religious social movement that was affiliated with Islamic scholar Said Nursi) and that the US provided financial aid to Turkish schools established abroad by Gülen’s disciples are baseless and fabricated.
When the government launched the peace talks with Öcalan, Gülen was among the first opinion leaders who endorsed the process, in what seemed a critical stance as part of efforts to convince the conservatives who are generally not warm to any kind of engagement with the terrorist organization.
In early January, Gülen said as long as national dignity and pride are not undermined, every necessary step should be taken to maintain peace because “there are benefits in peace.” He said those steps should be taken even if they seem unnerving at first. The Islamic scholar, known for his teachings promoting intercultural and interfaith peace, recalled that the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, which took place between Muslims and pagan Arabs in the early days of Islam and established a 10-year truce in Mecca and Medina, included some articles which were very difficult for Muslims to accept at first but later turned out to be to their benefit.
In the minutes Öcalan claimed that Gülen has links to counterterrorism units of Turkey.
“He [Gülen] lives in the US. He has opened 120 schools. Where does the money come from? Florida is the old center of the [Turkish] counterterrorism department. Alparslan Türkeş [the founder of the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) and a retired colonel died in 1997] and counterinsurgency units of Central American countries were trained there. The new center is the US State of Utah. Emre Uslu [a political scientist and a columnist for Today's Zaman] was trained there [Utah]. [Turkish] counterterrorism has taken control of rightist and leftist groups in Turkey," Öcalan is quoted as saying in the minutes that appeared in the Milliyet report.
Albayrak said his client always promoted social peace, rights and justice through his speeches and writings, adding that Gülen has not involved in a situation of lawlessness.
As to the claim in the minutes suggesting that the Turkish schools were established thanks to the financial backing of the United States, Albayrak said those schools, which were built in more than 140 countries, were established by financial support of the generous Anatolian people. He said no country has given a single penny except the generous Anatolian people (supporters of Islamic scholar Gülen) in establishment of the schools. He said such claims are insult to the altruist Anatolian people.
Published on Today's Zaman, 28 February 2013, Thursday
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