US embassy cable - 05ANKARA6772

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ANKARA 006772 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/17/2015 
TAGS: PGOV, PHUM, TU 
SUBJECT: JANDARMA INVOLVEMENT IN BOMBING ROCKS TURKEY 
 
 
(U) Classified by CDA Nancy McEldowney, E.O. 12958, reasons 
1.4 (b) and (d). 
 
1.  (C) Summary:  Turkey has been rocked by alleged jandarma 
involvement in a November 9 bombing in the town of Semdinli, 
in the ethnically-Kurdish southeastern province of Hakkari. 
After the blast, bystanders caught and severely beat three 
suspects.  Police released two of the three, including a 
jandarma sergeant, and detained a jandarma informant.  The 
event has sparked weeklong, at times violent, demonstrations 
in Hakkari.  Multiple and very public investigations are 
underway and there is widespread public agreement that there 
is some jandarma involvement.  The question is whether PM 
Erdogan's Justice and Development Party (AKP) government can 
force the jandarma to cooperate with the investigation; much 
of the public and media, inured to the coverups of the 1990s, 
are skeptical the investigation will be allowed to get to the 
bottom of the affair.  All high-level figures, from the PM to 
the President to the head of the Turkish General Staff (TGS), 
have publicly stated the investigation should go as far as 
needed to find those responsible.  End Summary. 
 
Two of Three Bombing Suspects Released 
-------------------------------------- 
 
2.  (U) On November 9, one person was killed in a bomb blast 
in a Semdinli bookstore.  Bystanders caught and severely beat 
three suspects before police arrived and took custody of 
them.  The suspects included a PKK informant for jandarma 
intelligence and a jandarma sergeant.  As a crowd gathered 
around the suspects' car, a prosecutor arrived to 
investigate; so did Hakkari parliamentarian Esat Canan, who 
happened to be in town at the time, and with whom we spoke on 
November 16. 
 
3.  (U) In the car, the prosecutor and Canan found weapons 
and documents allegedly linked to jandarma, including a 
supposed "hit list" of suspected PKK sympathizers, including 
the bookstore owner.  The crowd around the car grew, 
allegedly became violent, and jandarma opened fire, killing 
one person.  Police released two of the three bombing 
suspects, keeping only the informant.  Another jandarma 
sergeant who fired on the crowd was also kept in custody. 
 
4.  (U) Local anger over the bombing incident and the release 
of the two suspects sparked demonstrations in Hakkari 
province, some of them violent, for a week after November 9. 
Five people died in disturbances in the town of Yuksekova on 
November 15 disturbances spread to the provincial capital n 
November 16. 
 
Investigation, Parliamentary Response -- and Criticism 
--------------------------------------------- --------- 
 
5.  (U) PM Erdogan has repeatedly vowed a full investigation 
of the incident; Turkey's political establishment has 
publicly and unanimously backed his call in unprecedented 
fashion.  Prosecutors opened their investigation the same day 
as the incident.  Several parliamentary delegations have 
visited Hakkari province, and parliament is set to debate the 
affair next week.  Still, much of the public and media, 
particularly in the southeast, remains deeply skeptical that 
an investigation will get to the bottom of the affair. 
 
6.  (C) Erdogan and his ruling AKP government's response has 
drawn criticism.  Well-connected Hurriyet columnist Sukru 
Kucuksahin told us privately that he blamed PM Erdogan for 
not speaking out more forcefully against the civil unrest the 
incident has generated in the southeast.  He worried about 
nationalistic reactions inside Erodgan's AKP, from the 
military, and from the Turkish public if unrest continues. 
 
7.  (C) Aside from statements, Erdogan has, to date, done 
little publicly in response to the incident.  He has 
continued foreign travel uninterrupted, and, at least until 
his return to Ankara November 15, appeared more focused on 
disputes regarding headscarves than on events in Semdinli. 
Interior Minister Aksu, despite having the jandarma under his 
jurisdiction, has been virtually invisible.  A November 16 
press report claimed several AKP parliamentarians, including 
both nationalists and pious MPs, criticized AKP leadership 
for the civil unrest, a lack of focus on the incident, and 
 
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lack of information from Aksu. 
 
8.  (C) When we met with an exhausted parliamentarian Canan, 
a Kurdish member of the main opposition Republican People's 
Party (CHP), he was privately deeply pessimistic about the 
investigation.  He is critical of the decision to release the 
other two bombing suspects and fears that Semdinli's 
relatively junior prosecutor will be left alone to face down 
the district's powerful jandarma; some media have made the 
same criticism.  Canan predicts AKP will ask its 
parliamentary commission to investigate other events in 
addition to Semdinli, potentially watering down and delaying 
the results. 
 
No Dispute That Jandarma Involved 
--------------------------------- 
 
9.  (C) Turkey's paramilitary jandarma, under the command of 
a land forces general, is organizationally part of the 
Interior Ministry.  In a deeply nationalistic country where 
military forces enjoy the highest prestige of any 
institution, almost no one -- including the military -- is 
disputing some level of jandarma involvement in the bombing. 
Many see the Semdinli bombing as an act of revenge for a 
November 2 bombing outside local jandarma headquarters. 
 
10.  (C) Unlike past governments, PM Erdogan's pro-Islam AKP 
has no affection for the secular military, no ties to it, and 
no reason to squelch the investigation.  Even the main 
opposition CHP, which delights in playing the nationalist 
card, has not tried to point the finger away from jandarma 
involvement.  The lingering question mark is whether the AKP 
government can force the jandarma to cooperate with the 
investigation.  A leading columnist told us that jandarma 
commander General Turkeri told him he had not yet spoken with 
Minister Aksu, his ostensible boss, about the incident, and 
had no intention of doing so.  The columnist speculated that 
Aksu was too intimidated to raise the issue with "his" 
general. 
 
Military Reaction Muted, Deferential to Judiciary 
--------------------------------------------- ---- 
 
11.  (SBU) PM Erdogan declared on November 12 that he had 
consulted with TGS Chief Ozkok and President Sezer, who 
agreed that the incident should be fully investigated.  The 
military's public reaction so far has been muted, cautious 
and deferential to the judicial process, but has generated 
some controversy. 
 
12.  (U) TGS Chief General Ozkok told the press on November 
11, "I will neither accuse nor protect my personnel."  The 
media criticized land forces commander General Buyukanit for 
his public statement that he knows the jandarma sergeant 
allegedly involved in the bombing and believes him to be a 
good soldier, although Buyukanit added that the investigation 
will determine whether the sergeant is guilty or not. 
 
13.  (U) Jandarma commander General Turkeri has come under 
the most fire, including from PM Erdogan, for his November 11 
statement that appeared to minimize the affair as only a 
"local incident."  Much of Turkey's conspiracy-minded public 
believes the incident is the work of a vast "deep state" 
network including the military, intelligence officials, 
bureaucrats, judges and prosecutors, and they see Turkeri's 
statement as an attempted coverup.  However, even Turkeri 
called for developments to be left to the judiciary. 
 
Comment:  Much to Gain, Much to Lose 
------------------------------------ 
 
14.  (C) The political consequences of the Semdinli incident 
are only beginning to play out.  The incident brings together 
some of Turkey's most sensitive and important issues:  the 
heavily-Kurdish southeast, the PKK, and the GOT policies 
toward them; civil/military relations; and the AKP 
government's ability and willingness to work for rule of law. 
 This is an opportunity for the GOT to show determination to 
use the rule of law expeditiously to get to the bottom of an 
ugly incident reminiscent of the 1990s.  They have much to 
gain if they succeed, and much to lose if they fail -- in 
terms of credibility with their own party base; with the 
 
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public in the southeast, highly skeptical of anything coming 
from Ankara; with the military; with the EU. 
 
15.  (C) If the investigation goes high and deep into the 
jandarma, the military's deferential attitude may change, 
sparking outright confrontation between the military and the 
AKP government.  At this point, we see no indication of this 
scenario.  More likely, nationalist criticism of the AKP 
government's handling of the incident could stiffen, 
including inside AKP itself.  Continuing civil unrest in the 
southeast spawned by the incident will increase pressure on 
Erdogan and AKP to react strongly -- but an overreaction will 
further alienate the southeast's already-restive Kurds, AKP's 
own Kurdish MPs, and the EU. 
MCELDOWNEY