Unlike a number of previous cases in which the General Staff remained silent for weeks in the face of scandals involving members of the military, the military command yesterday was quick to respond to a news report on a top general's alleged illegal wiretapping orders and its responsiveness has been seen as a promising sign amidst Turkey's accelerated efforts to balance civilian-military relations

The General Staff posted a statement on its website at 9:50 a.m. yesterday morning in response to a news story published by the Taraf daily yesterday reporting that Deputy Chief of General Staff Gen. Aslan Güner, who ordered the purchase of a wiretapping system from Israel to wiretap Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) terrorists in 2007, instead illegally wiretapped nearly 2,000 civilians, including prominent figures. “An administrative investigation has been launched into the issue,” the military's statement said. Although the questions surrounding past military investigations raise suspicions about the fate of this probe, the fact that the General Staff wasted no time speaking to the public about the allegations raised hopes for a change of attitude in the military regarding wrongdoings within its ranks under the command of newly appointed Chief of General Staff Gen. Işık Koşaner, who replaced Gen. İlker Başbuğ on Friday.“It is too early to comment on the fate of the probe, but the fact that the reaction time was very short is promising for Turkish democracy. We can see this move as a positive step. Since the statement came quickly even though yesterday was Victory Day, an official holiday, signals that some taboos are being broken within the Turkish Armed Forces [TSK],” retired Col. Mesut Ülker, a strategist, told Today's Zaman.Taraf reporter Mehmet Baransu, who exposed this most recent wiretapping scandal as well as many past failures of the military in preventing terrorist attacks and a number of coup plots devised by military officers, has little hope regarding the fate of the military investigation on the wiretapping scandal, but acknowledges that the General Staff's immediate reaction is a positive sign. “It seems that the term of Gen. Koşaner will be slightly more positive than that of Gen. Başbuğ. But I hope the outcome of such probes also becomes more positive than those of the past,” Baransu told Today's Zaman. Gen. Başbuğ was frequently criticized by observers for interfering in ongoing judicial cases and covering up the military's wrongdoings.Turkey's problematic civilian-military relations showed signs of normalization early this month during the annual Supreme Military Council (YAŞ) meeting, where the civilian segment of the body for the first time gave up its habit of rubber-stamping the military's promotion list of top commanders and stood firm against the promotions and appointments of controversial military figures. “In the end, the military surrendered to democracy during the YAŞ meeting and such positive signals are to continue,” Ülker says.Stressing that he believes that the new command echelon of the TSK, which was shaped during this year's YAŞ, will adopt a stance in favor of democracy, Ülker says this new stance from the General Staff can also be seen as an effort by the military to take a more active role in controversial cases within its ranks by learning from previous cases in which it failed to inform and convince the public.Recently the General Staff waited 20 days to make a statement regarding allegations that the military failed to act against terrorists on the night of an attack by the PKK on the Hantepe outpost in Çukurca, Hakkari province, that killed six soldiers despite intelligence provided by Heron unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) showing the terrorists' advance. The belated statement said the images from the Herons published in various newspapers were “incomplete and false” and blamed the military's failure to send reinforcements to the region on adverse weather conditions, which failed to convince the families of the slain soldiers and the public.Last month the General Staff also sank into a dead silence for eight days after a news story was published in the Bugün daily that reported on an air force pilot who spoke of shooting down UAVs to protect PKK militants.According to the report that appeared in the Bugün daily on July 15, an air force officer in wire communications asked a high-ranking pilot to shoot down the UAVs or change their flight plans because they were causing too much damage to PKK terrorists, who he referred to as “ours.” In a statement found far from convincing by many observers, Gen. Metin Gürak, head of the General Staff's department of communications, said on July 25 that an ongoing investigation had not provided any clues about the identity or military ranks of the officers implicated in the recordings. He also said the Military Prosecutor's Office was continuing its search for evidence related to the incident.The TSK adopted a similar stance regarding a number of recently exposed subversive military plots that sought to undermine the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) and lay the groundwork for a military takeover.Ülker says the TSK may have revised its communications strategies under the command of Gen. Koşaner, adding that he sees a stronger will in the military to remain within the boundaries of democracy, as they have no other option.‘Gen. Güner apparently violated laws'Baransu reported yesterday in Taraf that Gen. Güner, who was at the helm of the General Staff's intelligence department in 2007, wiretapped nearly 2,000 civilians with a wiretapping system purchased for the General Staff's Electronic Systems Command (GES). However, according to a law that was passed in 2005, the tapping of telephones was put under the authority of three institutions: the National Intelligence Organization (MİT), the National Police Department and the Gendarmerie. However, a court decision is needed for those institutions to wiretap a phone. When a court decision is issued for the wiretapping of a phone, it needs to be approved by the Telecommunications Directorate (TİB). The GES does not have the legal authority to wiretap phones in Turkey.A military officer who revealed Güner's alleged illegal actions on condition of anonymity also said that if TİB launches an investigation into his arguments, it can easily find the wiretap recordings. Taraf says an investigation may be launched into Güner if the illegal wiretapping is documented since only MİT, the National Police Department and the Gendarmerie are authorized to take such measures.Among the individuals whose phones were allegedly wiretapped were academics Baskın Oran and Doğu Ergil; former minister Fikri Sağlar; actor Kenan Işık; Equality and Democracy Party (EDP) leader Ziya Halis; Kurdish intellectual and author Orhan Miroğlu; Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) deputies Sırrı Sakık and Sabahat Tuncel; and former Democracy Party (DEP) deputy Leyla Zana.After coming to power in the 2002 parliamentary elections, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) began working on a new law that would authorize a single institution to regulate wiretapping as part of Turkey's European Union harmonization process. TİB was founded with this purpose with a law that was passed in 2005 and the law gave the authority to wiretap phones only to three institutions, binding this authority to the permission of TİB and a court decision. This law also establishes a minimum jail term of three years for those found to have engaged in illegal wiretapping. 31 August 2010, TuesdayŞULE KULU  İSTANBUL