Turkish Lobby Group 'Declares War' on Sibel Edmonds' Under-Oath Testimony
By Brad Friedman on 8/14/2009 11:59AM
Turkish Lobby Group 'Declares War' on Sibel Edmonds' Under-Oath Testimony
Unbylined Turkish Coalition of America blog post slimes FBI whistleblower as 'disgruntled and discredited'...
In a rather extraordinary unbylined blog item posted on Wednesday, the Turkish Coalition of America (TCA), has launched what appears to be an all out assault on FBI whistleblower Sibel Edmonds and her remarkable, long-awaited under-oath deposition taken over the weekend in the Ohio Election Commission (OEC)'s Schmidt v. Krikorian case.
TCA Condemns Actions by Armenian Lobby Washington, DC – The deposition of former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds in Washington this past weekend was supposed to be the latest chapter in the defamation case filed by Congresswoman Jean Schmidt against David Krikorian, a candidate for Schmidt’s Ohio Congressional seat in the 2010 elections. Instead, her testimony was a recitation of a familiar story in American politics: a full-on assault against the national interests of the United States and the integrity of its justice system by the Armenian lobby.
Krikorian, whose candidacy is backed by various Armenian groups including the Armenian national Committee of America (ANCA), has made a series of unfounded and slanderous accusations of Congresswoman Schmidt, including that she has accepted “blood money” from the Turkish government. The Congresswoman’s case has been supported by the Ohio Elections Commission in a unanimous vote affirming her suit against Krikorian.
With no basis for these claims against the Congresswoman, and with President Obama and the United States Congress refusing to endorse ANCA’s version of century-old events in a now-defunct empire (the treatment of Ottoman Armenians during their rebellion against the Ottoman regime), Krikorian and his lobbyist backers are getting desperate.
Their latest stunt was to produce Ms. Edmonds, a former FBI translator with no knowledge of the case between Mrs. Schmidt and Mr. Krikorian. The key items that we learned on Saturday were that Ms. Edmonds has never heard of the any of the Political Action Committees that Krikorian has accused of trafficking in ‘blood money;’ she learned of the case between Krikorian and Schmidt eight days prior to her deposition; she has a self-aggrandizing imagination inflating her position at the FBI to that of an interrogator of terrorists; and that she has a book coming out this fall.
Why would she testify then? Was the Armenian Lobby merely trying to divert the court’s attention away from the case at hand by introducing a witness who would make further unfounded accusations against the Turkish government, none of which involved the defendant or the plaintiff? Or, one might ask, has there even been a bigger waste of time for the American legal system?
The irrelevance and insignificance of Ms Edmonds deposition can be evidenced by the fact that Mr. Geragos, Mr. Krikorian’s attorney of record, did not bother to show up. Instead, Krikorian was represented by a proxy attorney whose familiarity with the case extends to a few hours before the deposition took place. And who could blame Mr. Geragos? His job is to serve as a defense attorney in this particular case, not to watch a discredited former employee of the FBI (who served the federal government for a total of six months before being fired), give an in-depth analysis of apples when the topic of conversation was supposed to be oranges.
Saturday’s deposition was nothing more than an opportunity for Ms. Edmonds to make unsubstantiated claims and air conspiracy theories ranging from the tragedy of September 11th, to lurid sexual innuendo regarding unnamed members of Congress, and briefcases full of money. Stories such as this belong in a John Grisham novel rather than a formal legal proceeding.
Nor were the Armenian lobby’s tactics limited to Ms. Edmonds’ testimony. Following the deposition, the Communications Director for ANCA, Elizabeth Chouldjian (who conveniently also serves as a freelance “journalist” for Armenia Horizon TV), ambushed attorneys representing Mrs. Schmidt in a further attempt to steer the discourse away from the actual substance of the legal case. It is astonishing how low ANCA and its officials will sink to impose their view of history on others.
This diversionary tactic by the defense to confuse the issue is further evidence that the 83% of the Ohio 2nd District were correct in rejecting the flawed thinking of Krikorian, who was rejected first by both major political parties.
Furthermore, it displays the lethal mixture that results from a disgruntled and discredited former federal employee, a single-issue Armenian lobbying organization that serves the interests of a foreign government to the detriment of the security and interests of the United States, and a fringe candidate in a congressional election willing to make unfounded and slanderous accusations against public servants. Trying to manipulate a legal case is just the tip of the iceberg.
Called as a witness for David Krikorian (who is Armenian-American), Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-OH)'s opponent in 2008 and 2010, Edmonds (who is Turkish-American) testified to infiltration, bribery, corruption and blackmail within the U.S. Government, by current and former members of the U.S. House and other high ranking officials on behalf of Turkish interests. Schmidt, the co-chair of the Congressional Turkish Caucus has filed a complaint with the OEC alleging "false statements" by Krikorian during their 2008 contest when he had alleged she had taken "blood money" from those opposed to a Congressional declaration of Armenian Genocide by the Turks during WWI. Schmidt is also said to have taken more money from Turkish interests during the 2008 campaign than any other House candidate.
The TCA seems to have "declared war", according to Edmonds who touched base from out of the country via email on Wednesday. The scathing blog post alleges Edmonds' testimony was "a full-on assault against the national interests of the United States and the integrity of its justice system by the Armenian lobby"; says "Krikorian and his lobbyist backers are getting desperate"; and otherwise attempts to disparage Edmonds' character by describing her as "self-aggrandizing", and a "disgruntled and discredited former federal employee."
The report offers no evidence to support any of its allegations against Krikorian, Edmonds or "the Armenian Lobby". Many of the claims, particularly those concerning Edmonds, are directly contradicted by official reports from the FBI Inspector General's office, as well as senior, bi-partisan members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee...
"[S]he has a self-aggrandizing imagination inflating her position at the FBI to that of an interrogator of terrorists; and...has a book coming out this fall," the blog post claims about Edmonds. While we've interviewed Edmonds for many hours over the years, in depth, and read an extraordinary amount of reportage on her case, we've never heard or read any such claims of her having interrogated anybody. As to a book coming out, we know nothing of that either, though it would certainly be welcome!
While alleging in one breath that "Krikorian and his lobbyist backers are getting desperate", the blog post then goes on to make the rather, um, desperate, charge that: "The irrelevance and insignificance of Ms Edmonds deposition can be evidenced by the fact that Mr. Geragos, Mr. Krikorian’s attorney of record, did not bother to show up."
Huh? Krikorian himself flew in from Ohio for the deposition, and celebrity-attorney Geragos' firm is, in fact, representing Krikorian, but it's rather common for other attorneys in any law firm to be present for a deposition. While we don't have any particular dog in the Turkish Lobby vs. Armenian Lobby hunt, the use of such a silly claim would seem to suggest the author of the Turkish Coalition's post was fairly desperate themselves.
The TCA post goes on to ask why Edmonds' was called to testify in the case at all, since she admittedly had no specific information on Schmidt's personal involvement with the Turkish lobby or last year's race between her and Krikorian. Schmidt came to Congress in a 2005 special election, several years after Edmonds had left the FBI where she was a translator of pre-9/11 wiretaps.
Why would she testify then? Was the Armenian Lobby merely trying to divert the court’s attention away from the case at hand by introducing a witness who would make further unfounded accusations against the Turkish government, none of which involved the defendant or the plaintiff? Or, one might ask, has there even been a bigger waste of time for the American legal system?
We hate to say it, but this passage seems to offer still more desperation. The case concerns whether or not Schmidt has been unduly influenced by Turkish lobbyists and/or the Turkish government. Edmonds testified on just about a half dozen U.S. Congressmembers, current and former, who, she says, had been bribed, blackmailed and otherwise cajoled or strong-armed into support Turkish causes. Offering up a first-hand witness to such behavior by others in Congress seems a perfectly reasonable part of anybody's defense in such a case.
The TCA continues by then attempting to simply disparage Edmonds' character, describing her as "a discredited former employee of the FBI (who served the federal government for a total of six months before being fired)".
They do not, however, offer any actual evidence for their claims that Edmonds has been "discredited", even as the actual on-the-record evidence suggests quite the opposite.
In 2005, for example, portions of the FBI's own Inspector General's report on her case were unclassified. They reported her allegations to be "credible," "serious," and "warrant[ing] a thorough and careful review by the FBI."
As far back as 2002, Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-NE) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT), then the senior members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, co-wrote letters on Edmonds' behalf to Attorney General John Ashcroft, FBI Director Robert Mueller, and DoJ Inspector General Glenn A. Fine, calling on all of them to take action in respect to the allegations she's made to Congress and, later, to the 9/11 Commission.
Grassley would discuss Edmonds' credibility on CBS' 60 Minutes in a 2002 report when he said "Absolutely, she's credible...And the reason I feel she's very credible is because people within the FBI have corroborated a lot of her story."
To our knowledge, none of her on-the-record allegations about Turkish influence and/or infiltration in the U.S. government have been discredited. Though the TCA seems to have done a fine job of discredited themselves with such an irresponsible, evidence-free, unbylined attack on an FBI whistleblower.
Here's just a few more snippets from the blog item, which largely speak for and/or discredit themselves:
Saturday’s deposition was nothing more than an opportunity for Ms. Edmonds to make unsubstantiated claims and air conspiracy theories ranging from the tragedy of September 11th, to lurid sexual innuendo regarding unnamed members of Congress, and briefcases full of money. Stories such as this belong in a John Grisham novel rather than a formal legal proceeding.
...
It is astonishing how low ANCA [Armenian National Committee of America] and its officials will sink to impose their view of history on others.
...
Furthermore, it displays the lethal mixture that results from a disgruntled and discredited former federal employee, a single-issue Armenian lobbying organization that serves the interests of a foreign government to the detriment of the security and interests of the United States, and a fringe candidate in a congressional election willing to make unfounded and slanderous accusations against public servants.
Um, speaking of "mak[ing] unfounded and slanderous accusations against public servants"...Hey TCA, Pot is calling on line one, says you're black.
The top of both the TCA website and blog notes their tagline: "Fostering Understand of Turkish American Issues through Public Education."
While noted earlier, we don't have any personal stake in either side of the centuries old Turk vs. Armenian debate, but an outrageous post like that of the TCA's certainly engenders sympathy for the Armenian side of the question. For us, anyway. If that's how the Turkish Lobby is willing to behave, if that is their version of "Public Education", and those are the sorts of scurrilous allegations they're happy to make --- without even putting anybody's name on them, or offering evidence to back them up --- it certainly smells like they're a helluva lot more "desperate" than the "Armenian Lobby" they claim, without evidence, is behind this entire brouhaha.
Uighur Nationalism, Turkey and the CIA
Written by Farooq Hussain World Aug 14, 2009 Much was made in the news, earlier this month, of the series of violent clashes that erupted between Uighurs, a Turkic, and predominantly Muslim, minority ethnic group in China, and the Chinese state police, and Han Chinese residents in the the province of Xinjiang, in northwestern China.
But the media’s recent attention to the matter should be seen in light of a larger geo-political strategy, involving Turkey and the CIA, in ongoing furtherance of The Bernard Lewis Plan. Originally implemented under the supervision of Zbigniew Brzezinski during the Carter administration, the plan was based on Lewis’ idea of an “Arc of Crisis”, created around the southern borders of Soviet Union, by empowering Muslim radicals to rebel against the communists, to bring about the fall of the Soviet Empire. The key aspect of this strategy, over the last 30 years, as revealed in the book and movie, Charlie Wilson’s War, began with support for the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, which became the CIA’s largest covert operation ever.
As outlined in Brzezinski’s Grand Chessboard, control over central Asia, which in addition to Afghanistan, comprises the five former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, is a key factor in mastery of all of Eurasia, and thereby, the world.
Because, as is popularly known, Central Asia holds vast stores of energy resources. Less known, however, is it’s role in the drug trade. Since the implementation of Bernard Lewis’ Plan, and the US’ involvement in Afghanistan, the country now accounts for almost 95% of the world’s opium production. And it is profits arising mostly from this illicit trade that go largely to financing the deliberate spread of a fabricated brand of Islamic fundamentalism.
As mentioned by noted whistleblower Sibel Edmonds, “You get to a point where it gets very complex, where you have money laundering activities, drug related activities, and terrorist support activities converging at certain points and becoming one.”1
Despite years of her testimony being suppressed by the State Secrets Privilege, it is her revelations, discovered in the course of her work for the FBI, that now help explain the significance of the immigration case against Turkish religious leader, Fethullah Gülen, living in self-imposed exile in the Pennsylvania, and explodes this entire complex of American foreign policy in the Middle East and Central Asia, and it’s broader implications for the Islamic world.
Fethullah Gülen, while also leading the movement behind Turkey’s current Islamic renaissance, is one of the key operatives who have been fronting for the CIA in the radicalization of Central Asia, involving drug trafficking, money laundering, and the nuclear black market, and false-flag terrorism.
A number of sources reveal that the Gulen organization has been used as a tool for the Special Operations Department of the Turkish police force, which evolved from the Counter-Guerrilla, the Turkish branch of Operation Gladio.2 Operation Gladio was a clandestine initiative backed by the United States, which after WWII employed former SS to create “stay-behind” anti-communist. It was responsible for the infamous “Strategy of Tension” in Italy during the 70’s, which used false-flag terror operations, like that of the Red Brigade, to destabilize the country.3
In Turkey, there is a popular belief that the Counter-Guerrilla are responsible for numerous unsolved acts of violence, and have exerted great influence over the country’s Cold War history, most notably for engendering the military coups of 1971, and 1980.4
Among the documents that the attorneys for the State Department presented, in favor of rejecting Gulen’s application for a permanent visa, there are claims about the Gülen movement’s financial structure, it being emphasized that the it’s economic power reached $25 billion. The lawyers state:
Because of the large amount of money that Gülen’s movement uses to finance his projects, there are claims that he has secret agreements with Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Turkic governments. There are suspicions that the CIA is a co-payer in financing these projects.5
Most incriminating is the list of references that Gulen provided in an apparent effort to bolster his application, namely George Fidas, Graham Fuller, and Morton Abramowitz.
Graham Fuller happens to be listed as one of the American Deep State rogues on Sibel Edmonds’ State Secrets Privilege Gallery. Graham E. Fuller is an American author and political analyst, specializing in “Islamic extremism”. Formerly vice-chair of the National Intelligence Council, he also served as Station Chief in Kabul for the CIA. A “think piece” that Fuller wrote for the CIA was identified as instrumental in leading to the Iran-contra affair.6 The Iran-Contra affair was that network of activity whereby Israel sold weapons to Iran on behalf of the Americans, to fund the Contras, and then where a large-scale drug-smuggling operation, involving cocaine from Nicaragua, was used to fund the Mujahideen in Afghanistan. 7
George Fidas worked thirty-one years for the CIA, while Morton Abramowitz was also deeply involved with Afghan Mujahideen and Kosovo rebels. Abramowitz was succeeded by Marc Grossman as ambassador in Turkey, after working under him in Ankara for a number of years. During that period, the US opened an espionage investigation into activities at the embassy involving Major Douglas Dickerson, a weapons procurement specialist for Central Asia. Dickerson and his wife, an FBI translator, later became famous when they tried to recruit Sibel to spy for this criminal network. Grossman is currently receiving $1.2 million per annum from Ihlas Holding, a Gulen-linked Turkish conglomerate. 8
With regards to the separatist moves over Xinjiang, according to TurkPulse: “One of the main tools Washington is using in this affair in order to get Turkey involved in the Xinjiang affair is some Turkish Americans, primarily the Fetullah Gulen.”9
Another Turk used in this affair is Enver Yusuf Turani, also featured in Sibel’s Gallery, who is Prime Minister of Xinjiang, with the US being the only country to recognize it as “East Turkistan”. East Turkistan is the home of the “Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement,” a UN-nominated terrorist organization “funded mainly by Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda network and received training, support and personnel from both the al-Qaeda and the Taliban regime of Afghanistan. “10 The Uighurs constitute as many as 22, of the Guantanamo Bay detainees. Five of those have been set free, and were eventually sent to Albania, amid much controversy.
In fact, Abramowitz and Fuller were key players in the establishment of `East Turkistan,’ “proclaiming the government in exile within 4-5 months, starting in May (2004) and completing the proclamation in mid-September. The ceremony was held at Capitol Hill under American flags in Washington.” 11
The FSB, the Russian intelligence organization formerly called the KGB, has repeatedly taken action against the Gulen movement for acting as a front organization for the CIA. The FSB has claimed that the `Nurcus’ religious brotherhood in Turkey has engaged in espionage on behalf of the CIA, through the companies connected with Fethullah Gulen. Russia has banned all of Gulen’s madrassas, and in April of this year, banned the Nurcu Movement completely.12
The Gulen Movement founded madrassas all over the world in the 1990’s, most of them in the newly independent Turkic republics of Central Asia, including Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia. The madrassas, says one writer named Lukery, “appear to be used as a front for enabling CIA and State Department officials to operate undercover in the region, with many of the teachers operating under diplomatic passports.”13
Lukery called Sibel Edmonds to ask her to comment on the latest revelations. She said, in full:
You’ve got to look at the big picture. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the super powers began to fight over control of Central Asia, particularly the oil and gas wealth, as well as the strategic value of the region.
Given the history, and the distrust of the West, the US realized that it couldn’t get direct control, and therefore would need to use a proxy to gain control quickly and effectively. Turkey was the perfect proxy; a NATO ally and a puppet regime. Turkey shares the same heritage/race as the entire population of Central Asia, the same language (Turkic), the same religion (Sunni Islam), and of course, the strategic location and proximity.
This started more than a decade-long illegal, covert operation in Central Asia by a small group in the US intent on furthering the oil industry and the Military Industrial Complex, using Turkish operatives, Saudi partners and Pakistani allies, furthering this objective in the name of Islam.
This is why I have been saying repeatedly that these illegal covert operations by the Turks and certain US persons dates back to 1996, and involves terrorist activities, narcotics, weapons smuggling and money laundering, converging around the same operations and involving the same actors.
And I want to emphasize that this is “illegal” because most, if not all, of the funding for these operations is not congressionally approved funding, but it comes from illegal activities.
Mazars and Deutsche Bank could have ended this nightmare before it started.
They could still get him out of office.
But instead, they want mass death.
Don’t forget that.
