(CPJ/IFEX) – The following is a CPJ press release: **Updates IFEX alerts of 8 July, 6 July, 11 June, 9 June and 20 May 1999 and 24 July 1998** CPJ Urges Turkey to End Criminal Prosecutions of Journalists Istanbul, Turkey, July 23, 1999 – The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) issued a report […]
(CPJ/IFEX) – The following is a CPJ press release:
**Updates IFEX alerts of 8 July, 6 July, 11 June, 9 June and 20 May 1999 and
24 July 1998**
CPJ Urges Turkey to End Criminal Prosecutions of Journalists
Istanbul, Turkey, July 23, 1999 – The New York-based Committee to Protect
Journalists (CPJ) issued a report today documenting Turkey’s continuing use
of criminal prosecutions to silence journalists who report on sensitive
topics, such as the Kurdish question and the role of Islam in politics.
At a press conference in Istanbul, a CPJ delegation expressed its concern
that the prosecutions continue despite official promises made to CPJ and
other international press freedom organizations that visited Turkey in July
1997. During high-level meetings at that time, Turkish government officials
pledged unequivocally to take steps to end the criminalization of
journalism.
“Our colleagues in the Turkish media remain at risk just for reporting the
news or stating a view,” said CPJ Executive Director Ann K. Cooper. “While
the majority of those targeted for prosecution write for the pro-Kurdish,
Islamist, and leftist press, recent cases against a prominent mainstream
Turkish reporter and a foreign correspondent show that no one is immune.”
Two years ago, then-deputy Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit told CPJ, “I
consider freedom of expression as a vital component of democracy.” Today,
Ecevit is Turkey’s prime minister. CPJ has requested a meeting with him to
discuss the press freedom concerns raised in the report and is awaiting a
response.
Following CPJ’s 1997 mission, the Turkish government granted a limited
amnesty that resulted in the release of at least eight jailed editors and
quashed dozens of cases pending against journalists in court.
“But the government’s promise of comprehensive legal reform remains
unfulfilled,” Cooper said. At the end of 1998, CPJ confirmed through its
research that Turkey held 27 journalists in prison – more than any other
country in the world for the fifth consecutive year.
CPJ’s investigation, conducted during the past two weeks by Middle East
Program Coordinator Joel Campagna, revealed that journalists continue to be
indicted, convicted, and imprisoned for the publication of news and opinion.
“The 27 cases documented in the report represent only a sampling of the
total number of criminal cases pending against journalists, which CPJ
believes to number in the hundreds,” Campagna said.
Among the most recent cases included in CPJ’s 12-page report:
– On May 18, 1999, Oral Çalislar, a veteran reporter with the mainstream
daily Cumhuriyet, was convicted of disseminating “separatist propaganda”
under Article 8 of Turkey’s infamous Anti-Terror Law. Çalislar’s offense was
a 1993 book in which he reprinted interviews with Abdullah Öcalan, leader of
the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), who was recently sentenced to
death in Turkey on treason charges. The interviews had originally been
published earlier that year, without incident, in Cumhuriyet. He received a
13-month prison sentence.
–On June 4, 1999, Turkish authorities arrested Hasan Deniz, an editor with
the Kurdish nationalist daily Özgür Bakip. An Istanbul State Security Court
then charged Deniz under Article 169 of the Turkish Penal Code (aiding an
illegal terrorist organization). The basis for the charge was a news article
that had appeared in the newspaper a few days earlier, reporting that the
PKK supported Öcalan’s call for an end to the brutal 15-year conflict
between the Turkish army and Kurdish rebels in Southeast Turkey.
–Six days after Deniz was arrested and charged, a criminal court in
Istanbul charged Andrew Finkel, a Turkey-based correspondent for Time
magazine and several other Western publications, with insulting the Turkish
military – an offense that carries a six-month prison term. The charge
against Finkel, an American citizen, stemmed from an article he had written
for a mass-circulation Turkish daily describing his recent visit to a
garrison town in the Southeast. Quoting military officials, Finkel wrote
that the soldiers were apparently trying to win the “hearts and minds” of
local inhabitants. They were “a long way from being an army of occupation,”
he added. Even so, prosecutors concluded that Finkel had insulted the
military.
CPJ called on the government to take immediate steps to reform Turkey’s laws
that stifle free expression and to guarantee the internationally recognized
right to report news and opinion without reprisal.
The delegation also urged the government, as a gesture of good will, to
endorse an amnesty proposal from Turkish Journalists Association. This week
the group submitted legislation to the government that, if approved by
parliament, would release journalists who are imprisoned for their work and
cancel pending prosecutions.
The report, Turkey: Criminal Prosecutions of Journalists, will be available
online at http://www.cpj.org. The Committee to Protect Journalists is an
independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to safeguarding
press freedom worldwide.
