Dutch Police Looking for Second Man in Connection with Cemil Onal Murder

Onal was shot dead in a hotel in a park in Rijswijk, a suburb of The Hague, on May 1, with the Dutch police saying that while the second suspect did not enter the park, he held a short meeting with the shooter before the murder was carried out.

After the shooting, he walked in a north-westerly direction towards the city’s centre and was last seen at a nearby petrol station.

He was initially wearing a black hoodie and white shoes, with a “dark area” on the heels of his shoes. Later, he had removed his hoodie and was wearing a black Champion-branded t-shirt.

The police are still looking for the shooter, who was described as “a man about 1.8 metres tall, with a normal to sturdy build, a beard, and black clothing, of which the clothes are very likely Adidas branded”.

At the time of the shooting, local news website Omroep West reported that the hotel’s owner had said he had seen “a man approaching without a face covering,” who then fired shots at the victim before running away.

An eyewitness said he had “heard three bangs and then saw someone run past”.

Onal was the former financial advisor of Turkish Cypriot businessman Halil Falyalı, who was himself shot dead in February 2022 near Kyrenia.

He had himself been arrested in the Netherlands in 2023 in connection with the Falyali assassination but successfully fought extradition to Turkey saying that his life would be in danger if sent back to the country.

His assassination comes after he gave a series of interviews to Cypriot news website Bugun Kibris regarding Falyali’s dealings with the highest levels of Turkey’s government and its ruling AK Party.

Onal had made reference to “dirty money being laundered”, bribes, and a “dirty network”, and has, according to Bugun Kibris, handed documents to American and Dutch intelligence.

At the centre of his allegations are a reported 45 or 46 cassette tapes which Falyali had kept and intended, if and when necessary, to use as blackmail against powerful figures.

According to Onal, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, who was also allegedly involved in the illicit business, appointed the son of longtime Erdogan ally and former controller of his discretionary funds Maksut Serim as Turkey’s ambassador in the north with the aim of recovering the tapes.

Yasin Ekrem Serim was appointed as ambassador last summer and, according to Onal, told, “get those tapes and bring them back, that is how you will rise in the state”.

However, it has been reported that while Turkey’s National intelligence organisation (Mit) had discovered that there were a total of 45 or 46 such tapes, Serim only recovered 40, and kept the other five for himself.

Turkey’s presidential communications directorate slammed the allegations, describing them as “fictitious” and “unfounded”, while the country’s foreign ministry promised to take legal action over the matter, describing the allegations as “unfounded” and “not based on any concrete evidence”.

Source: Cyprus Mail