Phone records prove Turkey’s involvement in Kessab attack: report

PanARMENIAN.Net - Media reports based on eyewitness and opposition sources saying that Turkey has become a party to the civil war in Syria have found their way into court proceedings, Al-Monitor reports.

During the trial of the Islamic State (IS) militants who attacked Turkish security forces at Nigde last year, court files revealed that Turkey, beyond supplying opposition forces with weapons and ammunition, had also given artillery support to the opposition groups that captured the Armenian-populated Syrian town of Kessab.

The prosecutor obtained striking admissions by tapping the defendants’ phones. According to documents obtained by Ahmet Sik of Cumhuriyet daily, the wiretapping transcripts reveal that the opposition forces at Kessab inform people in Turkey of the coordinates of Syrian army positions around Kessab, and then Turkey shells those locations.

On March 21, 2014 armed Syrian opposition groups entered Turkey from five different crossings and re-entered Syria at the Yayladag border crossing and seized Kessab. The town was retaken by Syrian government forces in June 2014.

The information collected from the Nigde assailants’ tapped phones contradicted official statements. According to the recordings, Adil Orli, the commander of the Bayir Bucak Turkmen Front, sends the coordinates through his brother Ayhan Orli to Mehmet Toktas, the president of the Yayladag Youth Association. In a conversation on June 7, Ayhan Orli reports that he had sent via WhatsApp the coordinates of seven targets he had received from Adil Orli. He says, “Firing was useful. Our friends solved the rest of the problems. But there are still seven locations. If you fire once on each, that will be enough.” Toktas answers, “Seven locations OK. Tell everyone to stay on defense in the coming moments.”

The two also talk of military assistance. Orli complains of a shortage of ammunition. Toktas says, “Let me talk to Ankara once more to see what is happening. Without ammunition, nothing can be done.”

The court documents contain remarks that reinforce suspicions about Turkey’s help to radical groups in the form of arms shipments. In a conversation between Ayhan Orli and President of the Syrian Turks Association Ahmet Sirin (alias Ahmad Ohrin), they say weapons sent from Turkey have actually gone to Ansar al-Islam, a group which is said to have links both to Islamic State and al Qaeda and generally operates jointly with Jabhat al-Nusra.