Former lieutenant colonel Özcan Karacan, who was captured one year after the July 15 coup attempt, acknowledged his ties to the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) in his first testimony and said it was a FETÖ "brother" (point man for the group) who instructed him to join the putsch bid.

Karacan was captured on Aug. 16 in the southern city of Antalya where he was in hiding under a false name. He is accused of coordinating airstrikes in the capital Ankara, where dozens were killed by putschists last year. He appeared before the court for the first time in a trial of pro-coup soldiers serving in helicopter units of the army. Karacan said he would not testify before the court, requesting time "to prepare his defense" but said he would not "deny the facts about him."

In his first testimony to interrogators after his capture that was read out by judges at the trial, Karacan said he was a successful student from a poor family and FETÖ set its sights on him. "They were never imposing on me but I always kept in touch with them," Karacan said. He claimed Gülenists did not interfere in his life but admitted that this changed during the coup attempt.

"Abdullah called me on July 6 [2016] while I was on vacation. He told me to end the vacation immediately and meet him," he said. Abdullah was a code name used by one of the "brothers" or civilian FETÖ figures commanding the group's infiltrators in the army. "I met him in his home in Ankara and he told me General Ünsal would give me an order and I should not ‘disappoint' him," Karacan said in his statements to interrogators. The General Ünsal he cited is Ünsal Coşkun, one of the generals in putschists' Peace At Home Council. "A few days before July 15, Ünsal Coşkun told me that there were ‘planned flights' and gave me a list of military personnel assigned to the flights. He asked me to pick the personnel for the missions," he added.

Karacan, a pilot who also served as commander of a helicopter battalion, is accused of instructing putschist helicopter pilots to launch strikes on several targets in Ankara during the coup attempt, which Ankara blames on members of the military who were part of FETÖ. He and other putschists seized the operations center of the main helicopter division of the military to carry out attacks on anyone opposing the coup. Acting upon his orders, putschists killed several in strikes on Parliament and other strategic locations.

Excerpts from radio communications between helicopter pilots include Karacan ordering an airstrike on a police vehicle. "Shoot the Cobra [police vehicle] if you can. Send in someone else if you can't," Karacan appears to say in an intercepted radio communication on July 15. Other intercepted conversations include Karacan ordering pilots to "fire at will." "Civilians, soldiers, police. All of them are our enemies," Karacan said over the radio while coordinating attacks on crowds of unarmed civilians gathered to confront the putschists in the capital.

Expelled from the army after the coup attempt, Karacan is being tried in three trials: The main trial on the coup attempt at the Office of Chief of General Staff, incidents at helicopter division and the assassination plot against President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Karacan is accused of picking military personnel dispatched to kill or capture Erdoğan on July 15. Erdoğan narrowly escaped the attempt and managed to mobilize the nation to fight the coup plotters.