MSNBC Turkish affiliate news article on Ankara University professor's findings of a Gulen-CIA connection
The following news article from December 2001 is from the Turkish affiliate of MSNBC, NTV-MSNBC; an English translation is provided here. Click here to view the original archived article on the NTV-MSNBC website. Dr. Necip Hablemitoglu, a professor of history at Ankara University, was assassinated in 2002; the case has still not been solved.
The Hablemitoğlu-Fethullah Gülen case
Dr. Necip Hablemitoğlu had also studied the Fethullah Gülen Community.
19 December— In these studies, he claimed that Fethullah Gülen was used by American Intelligence Gathering Network CIA.
The names of Ankara University faculty member Necip Hablemitoglu and Fethullah Gulen came together in the newspaper headlines on 4 January 2001. All the news that came out on that day focused on the same spot. In the news, the question was asked, “Is Fethullah Gulen a CIA agent?”
DGM [state security court] prosecutor Nuh Mete Yuksel, on 4 January 2001, moreover put further evidence to the Ankara No. 2 DM Court where the Fethullah Gulen trial was taking place. Yuksel’s claim was that “there is a link between Gulen and the American Secret Service, CIA.”
When Nuh Mete Yuksel’s was asked what the basis of his claim was, Yuksel said that it was taken from the report entitled “Operation Agents – Infiltration Spies and Fethullah-ists” written by Necip Hablemitoglu, employed as an Ankara University faculty member.
In the report, it is claimed that Fethullah Gulen, referred to as “Hocaefendi” [also written "Hodja Efendi," and translated variously as "Master Teacher," "Revered Teacher," or "Master Lord"] voluntarily worked as an agent for the CIA and lived under the protection of the FBI in the state of Pennsylvania, on a private estate designed for him, and the style hardened from time to time.
DGM Prosecutor Nuh Mete Yuksel, thus went to the Ankara No. 2 DGM with these additional documents. Hablemitoglu answered journalists’ questions about the trial thus:
“I ascertained the relationship between Gulen and the USA and CIA in the research I carried out in the United States. The greater part of what I detected is also known by the state’s intelligence units.”
HABLEMITOGLU'S REPORT:
- The model the US puts forward of sects [or cults] worldwide applies to our country’s Fethullah-ists. There is no-one in Turkey or the world who does not know that the US is the external support of the sect that is the biggest threat to our secular republic.
- Hocaefendi lives on a private estate in the state of Pennsylvania that is thronged with people and with a doctor on hand 24 hours a day. Following contacts with CIA personnel and the State Governor, it is understood, among other things, that the community has also opened a school within the state’s boundaries.
- The US embassy and consulates solve all the visa problems of those visiting the Hocaefendi people – issuing ten-year visas.
- According to personal statements from his supporters, Hocaefendi until recently was an agent for the Turkish state’s intelligence organizations. After the development of the link with the CIA, the status of this kind of information service continued for some time. Consequently, until the Turkish Armed Forces and MIT [the National Intelligence Network of Turkey] noticed this irregular relationship, public opinion continued to see them as being a symbol of peace.
- According to the Fethullah-ists, as one day Khomeini returned to Iran, the Hocaefendi people will also return in glory and sit in Cankaya [the Turkish President’s residence in Ankara].