A series of high-level meetings took place in April 2016 between Donald Trump ally Michael Flynn and representatives of the Turkish government, according to Wayne Madsen, a retired U.S. naval officer who blogs on security and intelligence affairs.

“The editor is aware of this operation because he was invited to be a part of it,” wrote Madsen.

In a follow-up call with Ahval, he described how a friend had called him up to ask him to get involved.

“He said, ‘well, I’ve just had a meeting with General Flynn, and there’s a project that our Turkish partners really are insisting that they involve’ me, myself on,” Madsen said.

Later, “the information came out that Flynn was in meetings about kidnapping (cleric-in-exile Fethullah) Gülen and renditioning him to Turkey.”

Although Madsen’s source did not directly reveal any details, he said that he had been able to piece together the outlines of the “project”, which would have included the kidnapping of Gülen, the dropping of the Turkey-linked corruption case against Iranian-Turkish gold dealer Reza Zarrab, and the July 15, 2016 failed coup attempt.

Madsen described the latter to Ahval as a “classic autogolpe, which is a self-coup, which is where the leader decides ‘I’m going to use this opportunity to jail all my opponents’”.

“My participation with unnamed third parties at a meeting in Washington, DC, followed by meetings in Turkey, was being requested in April 2016 and, when I was unable to attend certain meetings in Washington, the requests resumed in May,” Madsen said in his blog account.