ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — The Kurdistan Region Security Council (KRSC) is urging people on Saturday to assist and inform security (Asayesh) authorities if they have any knowledge for the whereabouts of a seventh suspect believed to be involved in the killing of a Turkish Consulate General employee earlier this month.
"… Siyako Baqi Abdulkarim, who is wanted by the security agencies of the Kurdistan Region, is accused of involvement in the July 17 terrorist attack of Erbil at which an employee from Turkey's Consulate in Erbil and two other citizens lost their lives," read a KRSC statement released by Kurdistan CT on Facebook on Saturday.
The KRSC is comprised of an umbrella group of security, intelligence, counterterrorism, and other agencies in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region. It did not provide any further identifying details such as age or nationality.
"We are calling on our beloved citizens that whoever has information on him, call the security agencies as soon as possible," the KRSC urged.
The call from the KRSC comes a day after they released video confessions of six suspects admitting involvement in this month's killing of Osman Kose.
Siyako was mentioned as a suspect, but security officials at the time did not reveal his possible whereabouts or if had been detained or arrested over the past 10 days.
The Kurdistan Region Security Council (KRSC) released video showing CCTV footage of the incident inside HuQQabaz restaurant and a video confession of the primary suspect, Mazlum Dag (Mazlum Mohammed Zaki).
“My name is Mazlum Mohammed Zaki. I was born in Diyarbakir in 1992. I came to Kurdistan in 2015 to work," Dag said.
He and five others — three from the IKR and three Turkish nationals — were arrested by the security authorities in Erbil for their alleged collaboration. All said they had played various roles in the killing of Osman Kose, the employee at the Turkish Consulate General in Erbil.
He said that another of his brothers also was active politically in Turkey and wanted to join the PKK in the mountains of Qandil in the Iraqi Kurdistan Region. Dag said he visited Qandil and joined the PKK through his brother, Ibrahim, who introduced him to an individual named Fatih (Botan).
“I stayed with them [PKK in Qandil] for about 26 days. During these 26 days, I became familiar with their lifestyle," Dag explained.
There, Dag says he learned to shoot: “Fatih had a corpse which we used for training." Then Dag says Fatih asked him to smuggle clothes and shoes from the Kurdistan Region to Qandil and agreed.
Confessions, even of those in custody, are frequently considered by courts as proof in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region of a suspect’s guilt in a crime.
The July 17 shooting took place at a Turkish restaurant in the upmarket Empire complex in Erbil. Turkish official Osman Kose and two Kurdish civilians died when three gunmen opened fire with pistols fitted with suppressors.
Turkey has begun "neutralizing" alleged planners of the incident in which the diplomat and two Kurdish civilians died. Ankara's actions are based on the premise that the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) was involved in the attack.
On Wednesday, senior PKK commander Bahoz Erdal denied the armed group was involved in the “amateur” Erbil attack, but praised the perpetrators for killing a “blood sucker”.
The PKK's armed wing People's Defense Force (HPG) said in a statement on Friday that they have no connection to the perpetrator.
The attack has been condemned by Kurdistan Region officials, foreign diplomatic missions, and by Turkey’s pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP), which called on the media and political opponents not to defame its MP Dersim Dag – the sister of one of the suspects, Mazlum Dag.
Translation by Zhelwan Z. Wali
