Turkish Deputy PM: PKK getting more foreign aid than ever

ANKARA

The terrorist group PKK is now getting more foreign aid than ever before, Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said Wednesday.

Speaking at the Anadolu Agency’s Editors’ Desk in Ankara, Kurtulmus said the terrorist group received the largest amounts of foreign aid in its history while it got portrayed as a "disciple of peace".

The aid also involved logistics support, which enabled the PKK terrorists to "set up traps" against Turkish security forces, the minister said.

Kurtulmus said Turkey's fight against terrorism was a serious and ongoing process, highlighting that operations against the group would continue until the desired outcome is achieved.

“Terror is not just a matter of [fighting] a thousand militants. It is a perpetual process for Turkey. And we are dealing with it in a serious manner.

"Hopefully, we will get results. However, it would be misleading to give an exact date as to when they will end,” he said.

The PKK – listed as a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the EU – resumed its 30-year armed campaign against the Turkish state in July 2015.

Since then, over 350 Turkish security personnel have been martyred and thousands of PKK terrorists killed in operations across Turkey and northern Iraq.

During his remarks, Kurtulmus also referred to the ongoing fight against the “parallel state,” saying the struggle against the FETO group would continue in a legal manner.

"We have to protect the state and the nation. We would not blame anyone in an unjust manner or attack their individual rights. The struggle against the FETO organization is one that is being carried out in a lawful manner, and it will continue.

“However, if you are asking me when it will end, we cannot give a date for it either,” he said.

Headed by Fetullah Gulen, a U.S.-based Islamic preacher who runs a network of schools and commercial enterprises in Turkey and around the world, the “parallel state” represents a clandestine group of Turkish bureaucrats and senior officials, allegedly embedded in the country’s institutions, including the judiciary and the police.

Known also by the initials FETO/PDY, the organization is also said to be behind a December 2013 corruption investigation into senior government figures, including ministers.

Since early 2014, investigations into the parallel state have seen hundreds of civil servants, including police and public prosecutors, arrested or reassigned.

Most recently, dozens of people were detained Tuesday in nationwide operations as part of an investigation into the financial activities of the "parallel state".

Sixty-eight suspects, including ministry staff, businessmen, teachers, lecturers and former chiefs of police were detained in simultaneous operations carried out in 20 provinces Tuesday morning, sources at the Anti-Smuggling and Organized Crime Department in Ankara told Anadolu Agency.

Detainees also included company executives, municipal employees, presidents of foundations and associations, so-called provincial heads of the "parallel state" as well as some employees of the national broadcaster, TRT. The suspects are accused of helping collect money for the FETO/PDY, and transferring it to the group.