According to officials in Northern Cyprus, fugitive Comanchero bikie chief Mark Buddle has been extradited to Turkey where he will likely be processed before being turned over to Australian authorities.
The most wanted man in Australia was apprehended on Saturday as he made his way back to his refuge on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus.
He had fled the country in 2016 after becoming wanted in connection with a number of killings.
Buddle is on his way to Turkey, where Australian authorities aim to try and extradite him to his country.
However, there are worries that Buddle would leave the nation before extradition is authorized.
Buddle acquired a residence permit to dwell in the statelet last August due to his “high income,” but the interior ministry of the self-declared Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus said in a statement that his presence was “inconvenient in terms of public order and security.”
The notorious bikie, 44, was moved on Sunday under the watchful eyes of two policemen to the capital of Turkey, Ankara.
Legal proceedings for Mark Douglas Buddle’s extradition to his native country are still ongoing in Ankara, according to a statement from Cypriot authorities.
Australia and Turkey have an extradition agreement that states that anyone accused of a crime that carries a minimum one-year jail sentence must be extradited.
However, sources from the police and the underworld agreed that the situation was far from resolved.
According to a source who spoke to The Daily Telegraph, “I suspect he travelled there (Turkey) the first day he was arrested.”
At the end of the day, Turkey is the problem, not Australia or America, mate.
The net is drawing in closer to Buddle, but this is far from over, said a senior Australian law enforcement official.
Buddle recently travelled to Germany to meet with a prominent international gang member, leaving his most recent safe haven on the island nation.
Before news broke on Sunday that American officials had swooped on the mobster, he first travelled back to the country’s north via Turkey, a region where many Australian fugitives hide out.
“Mark Buddle has been arrested.” One Sydney insider told Daily Mail Australia that the boys were aware of it hours earlier.
Later, the US Crime Bureau denied being involved in the sting operation.
When previous leader Mahmoud “Mick” Hawi was imprisoned for a fatal brawl at Sydney Airport in 2009, Buddle took over the Comancheros.
After being identified as a person of interest in the 2010 murder of a security guard, he left Australia for Dubai in 2016, where he established a new life with his partner Melanie Ter Wisscha.
Buddle fled Dubai last year shortly after a video of him shoving vacationers at a pool circulated online.
Since then, he is believed to have travelled extensively, stopping in Turkey, Greece, and Iraq before settling in Cyprus.
The criminal boss, who was born in Sydney and was raised on a Maroubra housing commission estate before joining the Comanchero, is said to have moved to Cyprus in the middle of 2021.
His stay hasn’t been low-key, either; last year, he was on the main page of the Cyprus weekly Kibris Gercek.
According to the news source, Buddle made the decision to dwell in Northern Cyprus after meeting with powerful lawmakers, who gave him residency status through August 6, 2022.
His “substantial income to the country” was cited as the justification for the resident visa.
According to recent reports, Buddle was suffering greatly from the exile lifestyle since he was cut off from his daughters, who were reportedly living separately from him in Australia as the Commander of the Comancheros’ Australian section.
Buddle left the Comanchero in Australia in the care of Sydney commander Alan Meehan, national president Mick Murray, and sergeant-at-arms Tarek Zahed.
Zahed amazingly escaped an attempted murder in May at the Bodyfit Gym in Auburn, where he had been shot many times with more than 20 bullets discharged.
He was taken into surgery with 10 bullet wounds to his head and body after being transported to the hospital in a life-threatening situation. One bullet went straight through his eyeball.
During the shooting, his 39-year-old brother Omar died.
Meehan has been named Comanchero national president while Murray is charged in Victoria and Zahed is recovering from his wounds.