Turkish General Staff to take legal action on ‘illegal copying’

ANKARA

The top secret information was allegedly passed onto unauthorized people during an investigation into an alleged assassination attempt against Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç. AA Photo

The Turkish General Staff has said it will take judicial measures against individuals who permitted top secret information to be passed onto unauthorized people during an investigation into an alleged assassination attempt against Deputy Prime Minister Bülent Arınç.

“Judicial means will be taken for the individuals who led to the transmitting of information and documents about the General Staff inside a copy, which was handed to the public prosecutor’s office, to unauthorized people in a way contrary to the law,” read a part of a statement released March 13.

The statement also gave details about the legal process of the investigations conducted in the “cosmic room,” where the military’s secret information is kept, and stated that the copy of the 1.5 terabytes of “state secrets” taken during the investigations were handed over to the Public Prosecutor on March 16, 2013, because it was legally obliged to do so. The General Staff also said it wanted the truths about allegations against military officers to be revealed.

The investigation into an alleged assassination attempt targeting Arınç was dropped this week into 38 people after no evidence was found regarding the plot.

The decision also stated that it was not known who made the copies of a hard disk containing information gathered from the “cosmic room,” daily Milliyet reported March 12.