Susurluk Scandal - Background - Mafias - Drug Trafficking

Drug Trafficking

According to Interpol, "Turkey is a major staging area and transportation route for heroin destined for European markets." The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration estimated the 1997 volume of the Turkish heroin traffic at 4–6 tons per month.

The point of contention of the Susurluk gangs was the European leg of the heroin transportation route, which passes through Turkey. One fifth of the black money is tapped by the gangs as "commission"; a market on the order of $80 billion (1997). According to Doğu Perinçek, the lure of heroin proved irresistible to the state, which suffered a $40–50 billion loss in trade with Iraq due to the U.N. embargo and the Gulf War.

The biggest drug cartel was led by Hüseyin Baybaşin. The U.K. National Crime Squad estimated that 90% of the heroin in the United Kingdom (25–35 tonnes annually in the late 1990s) was under their control until 2002, when it had a bloody falling-out with its partners in the PKK. He settled in the U.K. after becoming an informer for the HM Customs and Excise office to reveal what he knew, as someone who traveled with a diplomatic passport, about the involvement in heroin trafficking of senior Turkish politicians and officials.

Baybaşin said the most important state official involved in controlling the heroin trade was Şükrü Balcı, who was then chief of the Istanbul police.

After every single transaction, certainly half the money would go to the state. To us it was like a tax in exchange for the all round protection we were getting. If the money was confiscated or we were arrested, our government contacts would come and pick us up and say we were working for the state. Even in Europe, they were still protecting us. When I made my second trip to Europe that year, I saw with my own eyes that all the consulates were in the business. At every consulate, there was a staff member officially assigned to found cultural centres and Turkish schools for example, and we would donate money for them. The Turkish Cultural Association was completely funded by money from the drug trade. —Hüseyin Baybaşin, Bovenkerk and Yeşilgöz, 1998: 273-4

Another narcotic that was trafficked in significant quantity was Captagon. A notable trafficker was a Mehmet Ali Yaprak of Gaziantep. Yaprak was ostensibly a businessman with a television channel (Yaprak TV), a radio station, and a tourism company (Hidayet Turizm). However, he also led a feared gang that smuggled Captagon over Syria and Saudi Arabia, according to the MİT report. His tourism company facilitated the trafficking. The report says that Yaprak donated 500 billion Lira to support Ağar's DYP campaign. Upon learning of Yaprak's wealth, Çatlı and a team of 6–7 dressed in police uniform kidnapped Yaprak on 25 May 1996 and took him to a house in Siverek belonging to the Bucak clan. The kidnapping, motivated by the desire to know where the Captagon was coming from and cut Topal out of the loop, was directed by police in Ankara. Yaprak paid 10 million DM in ransom, however Çatlı and his fellow kidnappers received only a small portion of this. When they found out that they had been cheated, they fell out with their overlords in Ankara. They then kidnapped Yaprak a second time and interrogated him, sending one copy of the interrogation tape to Bucak and another to Eymür through MİT agent Müfit Sement. Leveraging the tapes, Çatlı worked out an agreement with Ankara.

After Topal's capture, his friend Haluk Koral called Eymür for help. Topal had also been kidnapped by police chief İbrahim Şahin priorly.

Yaprak was convicted in 1997 for involvement in the assassination of Gaziantep Bar lawyer Burhan Veli Torun, and released due to an amnesty law (Turkish: Şartlı Salıverilme Yasası). In 2002, he was re-imprisoned after being caught with 5 million pills of Captagon. He died in prison, January 2004.

A market in the southeast town of Lice was destroyed by fire. Deputy Fikri Fikri Sağlar alleged that Lice was a center of drug processing, and that the factory was moved to Elazığ.