Imamoglu's Chief of Staff Kasapoglu questioned about 'phone': 'It can be detected'

Unlike her initial detention process, this time Kasapoglu was asked questions about an iPhone said to belong to Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu.

Kadriye Kasapoglu said, "I do not know whether the phone in question is an asset belonging to the IBB, and furthermore, I am not the person who should be performing checks regarding this matter." Among the questions asked to IBB Chief of Staff Kasapoglu was why she had spoken on the phone 1,237 times with Imamoglu's Head of Security, Mustafa Akin.

It was learned that the phone in question was found following the testimony of Naim Erol Ozguner, the Head of the IBB Information Technology Department, who was arrested in the second wave of the operation.

In his statement, Ozguner indicated that the number belonging to the phone belonged to Ekrem Imamoglu and that this line had appeared on his business card in the past.

Kasapoglu said, "I recall it as a phone that IBB Mayor Mr. Ekrem Imamoglu used with a phone number that had been on his business card for many years. However, because the phone number in question became known by a large number of people and eventually became a number that was called even for issues that should have been handled by the relevant IBB departments—and even became a very busy line positioned like the IBB's solution center—we forwarded the phone number in question to the landlines in the Chief of Staff's secretariat about 2 years ago," she said.

Kasapoglu continued her statement with the following remarks:

"In the technical examination to be conducted, it can be detected when such an anonymous device and line were forwarded and when the line was closed, along with all other data. I do not recall our IBB Mayor using the phone in question, and I have not seen this device with him. I know that the line that was inserted in the phone in question was deactivated a long time ago. I have no idea where the SIM card is right now. I remember that the phone was used without a password because it was used by many employees, so I have no idea about its password.

I believe the person referred to as 'Ms. Burcu' in the statement in question is my colleague Burcu Ciner Simsek, who is an official IBB employee responsible for the Chief of Staff's secretariat. There is a general practice at the IBB to deliver technological devices that have reached the end of their useful life to the relevant unit, the Information Technology Department. 

My colleagues may have delivered the phone to the Information Technology Department with this reflex, but I did not give any instructions regarding this phone on March 19, as alleged in the statement. I do not know what kind of procedure the relevant institution carried out regarding the phone; it is not within my scope of duty anyway. I do not know whether the phone in question is an asset belonging to the IBB, and furthermore, I am not the person who should be performing checks regarding this matter."