 A week before he died, Bitlis met the foreign ministers of Syria, Iran and Iraq to discuss Özal's peace plans.He was also investigating an issue which journalist Uğur Mumcu, assassinated in January 1993, had been, namely the funnelling of 100,000 rifles from Turkey to Kurdish armed forces in Iraq.The "Turkish Daily News" later interviewed an army general who said that the commander of the Joint United States Military Mission for Aid to Turkey (JUSMMAT) had complained about Bitlis to the chief of staff for collecting information about illegal activities pertaining to Operation Provide Comfort (OPC).