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13 septembre 2004

ISTANBUL - Al-Qaeda financed the bomb attacks against two synagogues and British interests in Istanbul that killed a total of 63 people in November 2003, one of the suspects told a court here Monday.

Adnan Ersoz, who faces a possible term of life in prison without parole, said the money was brought to Turkey by an unidentified "Syrian militant, ... 50,000 dollars (about 41,000 euros) of it via Europe and the other 100,000 dollars via Iran."

"We cannot speak of an Al-Qaeda branch in Turkey, but there were ties of mutual assistance between the group that committed the bombings and Al-Qaeda, and the money came from Al-Qaeda," Ersoz said.

Ersoz denied participating in the attacks, saying that he was in Iran at the time and the news of the bombings caught him by surprise.

In the third session of the trial that opened on May 31, Ersoz admitted to having trained in Afghanistan and Pakistan and met top Al-Qaeda leaders, including Osama bin Laden in Kandahar before September 11, 2001, but denied he was a member of the terror group.

Ersoz said the presumed leader of the terror cell that planned the Istanbul attacks, Habib Akdas, had approached him several times, asking him to help bring into the country the cash to finance the attacks, but he refused.

On November 15 last year, car bombs had targetted two Istanbul synagogues and, five days later, the British Consulate and a branch of the British-owned Hong Kong-Shanghai Banking Corporation (HSBC).

In addition to the 63 dead, which included British consul-general Roger Short, the attacks wounded about 750 people and shocked a nation that had never before witnessed urban terror on such a scale.

At Monday`s session of the trial of 69 people accused of involvement in the attacks, Ersoz acknowledged that he had received training in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where he met Akdas.

Akdas was reported killed in Iraq last week during a US raid on Al Anbar, near Fallujah, in a video recording purporting to show his body and delivered to the Turkish news agency Ihlas.

"We all learned the news of Akdas`s death from television — this brother has shown us the way to martyrdom," said another chief suspect, Harun Ilhan, who admitted he was one of the bombers.

In contrast to the cool Ersoz, the bearded, volatile Ilhan — who also faces life in jail — flaunted his presumed Al-Qaeda membership.

"I acknowledge having fought in the ranks of Al-Qaeda and I`m proud of it," he told the judge. "Al-Qaeda aims to combat American imperialism and the zionist regime in order to liberate Muslims."

Ilhan apologized to Muslim victims of the terror attacks and justified the synagogue bombings by saying : "All Jews are spies of the Zionist regime."

By attacking the synagogues, Ilhan said, his group had "sent them a message in a language they can understand."

He claimed full responsibility for the attacks.

The bombings "belong to Habib Akdas, Gurcan Bac (another suspect, still on the run) and me — all the others are innocent," Ilhan said.

The seven other suspects present in court Monday did not contradict him.

Some acknowledged having received training in Afghanistan but denied any part in the bombings, while others claimed they had simply been manipulated by the terrorists.

The trial resumes Tuesday and the currrent session is expected to last until Friday.