Ağar, who was protected from legal action by his parliamentary immunity, was excused this time by a doctor’s note.

The 1996 Susurluk affair exposed links between the Turkish state, the criminal underworld and Turkish security forces. Ağar, who was police chief shortly before the incident, is facing an investigation over his part in the unlikely arrangement between a famous mafia boss, a member of the security forces and a politician.

Ağar was missing yesterday, but for most, this was not unexpected. The president of the parliamentary Human Rights Commission, Zafer Üskül, recalled that in his testimony to the Susurluk Commission years earlier, Ağar said, “I will talk if the state wants me to.” Üskül said: “He could at least bother to tell us from which state he expects to hear a demand to talk. So many years have passed. Things that will be to the benefit of this country should certainly be told to this country’s courts. Is this government not the government of this state? Is there an embargo on this topic? He shouldn’t wait for an invitation; he should say all that he knows.”

Ağar, a former interior minister and former leader of the Democrat Party (DP), was to be tried yesterday, when a group of 30 people protested outside the courtroom, demanding that Ağar be placed under arrest.

The court ruled the case to be out of its jurisdiction and handed it over to the Ankara 11th High Criminal Court, responsible for hearing cases earlier heard by State Security Courts (DGM), which no longer exist. However, even if the trial had continued, Ağar would not have testified, since he had been excused by a medical report.

The protestors, representing the People's Front, demanded that the shady connections of Susurluk be exposed. The Ankara branch of the Modern Jurists' Association (ÇHD) also issued a press statement after the court hearing yesterday. ÇHD board member lawyer Selçuk Kozağaçlı read the statement: "We have gathered here to pursue the crimes of Ağar, which we believe were committed against the people. The suspect should answer for his 20 years of working for the group that committed crimes against the people. Only then can we make every single person before him and that came after him answer for their crimes and only then can the last guard be destroyed today. You can wear out the people for a short while; you can scare them and even, perhaps for a while, suppress them. But you can never permanently win. The ÇHD will be keeping watch on the opposing front until the last of the crimes against the people has been answered for."

Meanwhile, another group of 40 people protested in front of the İstanbul courthouse yesterday. Behiç Aşcı, speaking for the group who identified themselves as members of the İstanbul branch of the People's Front, petitioned the İstanbul Chief Prosecutor's Office at the courthouse seeking the status of co-plaintiff in the Susurluk case.

"Although 12 years have passed since the Susurluk incident, Ağar has not been tried for the other 1,000 operations that he has talked about," said Gürsel Sarıgül, another representative of the group. Sarıgül was referring to testimony of Ağar given to a parliamentary investigative commission into the Susurluk affair in 1996, when he said every illegal counterterrorism operation carried out by the group in question during his term as police chief was approved by the top military leaders of the country.

Susurluk and Ağar trial background

Hüseyin Kocadağ, a former police chief, Sedat Bucak, a southeastern clan leader whose men were armed by the state to fight separatist violence, and Abdullah Çatlı, an internationally wanted mafia boss, were involved in an accident in 1996 near the small township of Susurluk while riding in the same car. Kocadağ, Çatlı and his girlfriend, a former model, were killed in the accident. No serious arrests followed from the ensuing investigation, which had actually exposed, for the first time in modern Turkish history, a gang with links to the state. Retired Brig. Gen. Veli Küçük, who is currently in jail over suspected membership in a shadowy gang known as Ergenekon, was detained but then released in the Susurluk investigation. Küçük is not the only link between the Susurluk affair and Ergenekon, whose suspected leaders and members currently face charges of "membership in an armed terrorist group," "attempting to bring down the government," "inciting people to rebel against the Republic of Turkey" and other similar crimes.

In February of this year, charges were filed against Ağar for "establishing an armed organization for the purpose of committing crimes, failing to inform authorities of the whereabouts of a suspect, aiding and abetting, granting firearm licenses to Çatlı and Yaşar Öz in violation of the law, ensuring the granting of senior public servant passports to Çatlı and Öz in contravention of the law and dereliction of gubernatorial duty." Ağar, who served as governor of Erzurum in 1992, was appointed by then-Prime Minister Tansu Çiller as head of the National Police Force in 1993. He was the interior minister of the Çiller-led coalition government in 1996 until he was forced to resign after the Susurluk scandal.

Ağar was elected to Parliament in 2002, which gave him the protection of parliamentary immunity until July 22, 2007, when the party he led, the Democrat Party (DP), failed to pass the election threshold.

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