Ogün Samast Was With Two Other People When He Killed Hrant Dink

According to a telephone communication revealed by the Ergenekon investigation, there were two more individuals with Ogün Samast when he killed Hrant Dink and Yasin Hayal, the instigator of the murder, was a member of the Great Union Party at the time.

İstanbul - BİA News Center
05 August 2008, Tuesday

News reports in connection with the Ergenekon case claim that Ogün Samast came to the murder scene with two other people when he killed Hrant Dink, Armenian journalist, founder of Agos, Armenian-Turkish weekly, on January 19, 2007.

The claims confirm the Show TV images about two individuals who observe the shooter and then disappear in a construction site after the murder.

Gürses: The kid did not kill Hrant Dink alone

In Mustafa Kınalı’s report named “Two people took Ogün to Hrant”, which appeared in the newspaper Hurriyet, Associate Doctor Emin Gürses, who was arrested in connection with the Ergenekon case, tells that there were two individuals with Samast when he went to kill Dink and he learned this from a university student, a woman who witnessed the incident.

This explanation, which appears on the 159th page of  the 137th folder in the  appendices of the Ergenekon indictment, is based on the telephone communication Gürses had with an individual who he called “Paşam”.

These statements in Gürses’ telephone interview appeared in the media: “Now the kid (Ogün Samast) who went to kill Hrant Dink went there with two other individuals. The father of the girl who saw this comes to us and told, ‘My daughter saw them. They were speaking about the event and my daughter was behind them.’ The girl is a first-year student in a university. These men and this kid went and killed Hrant Dink. These men are not around. These men took this kid to Hrant Dink’s door. Their identities are not known.”

Allegation conforms with the Show TV images

It is not known how effective this new evidence will be, but the images that appeared during the Show TV news seem to confirm this allegation.

The images show an individual taking on his phone with his back turned to the Agos building and looking occasionally at someone near the building. Later, the same person watches, with another individual, Ogün Samast’s running away from the scene and they too disappear in a construction site.

Hayal was a BBP member at the time of the murder

According to another report published in Radikal by İsmail Saymaz, Ogün Samast was met with commotion at the Istanbul Branch of the Fight Against Terror Department like in the Samsun branch and two very friendly pictures taken with him were put in his file.

Another allegation was that Yasin Hayal, who is on trial as the instigator of the murder, was a member of the Great Union Party (BBP) until the day of the murder and that a document was fabricated to show that his membership was terminated on December 4, 2006, that is, a month and a half before the murder. (EÖ/TB)       

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