Brussels (Brussels Morning) – Belgium convicts Turkish operatives for attempting to assassinate Kurdish politicians, highlighting the country’s vigilance against foreign interference and violence.
A Turkish ‘hit squad’ that attempted to kill two prominent Kurdish political leaders on European soil has been sentenced in absentia by Belgian authorities. The plot, which dates back to 2017, desired to target Remzi Kartal and Zubeyir Aydar, both residents of Belgium for years as representatives of the Kurdistan National Congress.
The tribunal sentenced Zekeriya Çelikbilek, an ex-Turkish military officer and French citizen; Yakup Koç, who was discovered with a Turkish police ID. The sentenced individuals, who fled the country before being captured, have been sentenced to five years in prison by the Brussels Court of Appeal. According to Kartal and Aydar’s lawyer Jan Fermon, it’s obvious that the plot was orchestrated on demands from the Turkish government, an argument borne out by details noted by Belgium’s De Morgen newspaper.
According to thwarted communications, the plotters discussed directing the massacre and evading police detection. “You drive a massacre and can free me from the hands of the police,” Akkulak was mentioned as saying. They sought to buy GPS trackers and a motorcycle from which the assassination would be performed, before fleeing in a van and were caught surveying the KNK’s offices in Sint-Gillis, Belgium. Recorded discussions show that Koç was operating as a worker of the Turkish intelligence services, according to De Morgen, while he was also an ex-security officer at the Turkish embassy in Paris.
“The court considers a very strict penalty necessary to protect society against the actions of both defendants, who were qualified to pursue the civil parties to the country where asylum was obtained, with the plan to slaughter them there,” the judgement runs. “The facts attest to the defendants’ extremely dangerous attitude.”
The case highlights the volatility of the situation in Belgium, following an episode on a Kurdish family returning from a Newroz or Kurdish New Year celebration. This week saw an explosion of violence, as armed mobs of Turkish men terrorised Kurdish families and old people in Leuven, Belgium. The ‘manhunt’, aiming out and beating ethnic Kurds which left two in acute condition, was taught by so-called ‘Grey Wolves’, a group variously described as neo-fascist, ultra-nationalist and Islamist and which has fulfilled with and received vocal backing from elected, Turkish politicians in Belgium. The new disclosures over the 2017 assassination attempt will create additional pressure on the Belgian authorities to assess the degree to which Turkish paramilitary groups and confidential cells can operate on European soil.
Furthermore, evidence indicates potential links between the ‘hit squad’ and a wider network operating in France. The plotters are revealed to have been in close touch with representatives of the Turkish National Security Council and a military mercenary company known as Sadat, colloquially termed ‘the Turkish Wagner group’.
As such, the disclosures in Belgium could reignite a long-standing examination into the assassination of three major female Kurdish activists in Paris in 2013. Despite the demise of the prime suspect in that case, who also has connections to the Grey Wolves, it’s expected that justice can still be served. Kurdish representatives have criticised what they say is an eleven-year cover-up by the French justice and security services and required transparency from the French authorities over the threefold murder, which evidence indicates was a contract killing carried out by Turkish intelligence. In December 2022, just weeks before the tenth anniversary of the 2013 assassinations, three more Kurdish activists were eradicated in an armed raid on a Kurdish cultural centre in Paris.
