**Updates IFEX alerts of 12 and 11 July, 9 May, 9 and 1 March 2000, 30, 28, 24, 21, 10 and 9 September, 6 July and 25 June 1999** (CPJ/IFEX) – The following is a 24 August 2000 CPJ press release: TURKISH JOURNALIST APPEARS IN COURT “Banning the truth does not eradicate it,” says author […]
**Updates IFEX alerts of 12 and 11 July, 9 May, 9 and 1 March 2000, 30, 28, 24, 21, 10 and 9 September, 6 July and 25 June 1999**
(CPJ/IFEX) – The following is a 24 August 2000 CPJ press release:
TURKISH JOURNALIST APPEARS IN COURT
“Banning the truth does not eradicate it,” says author of controversial book about Kurdish insurgency
Istanbul, August 24, 2000 — Turkish journalist Nadire Mater, who is standing trial for “insulting” the powerful Turkish military in a book of interviews with former conscripts who fought in the civil conflict in southeastern Turkey, presented her defense today before a four-judge panel at the Beyoglu criminal court in Istanbul.
“The truth is plain to see. Banning the truth does not eradicate it,” Mater said before the judges in a small courtroom packed with local journalists and supporters, including CPJ board member Peter Arnett and Middle East program coordinator Joel Campagna. “Preventing [the conscripts] from talking does not stop the anxiety of mothers, fathers, wives, and girlfriends, who try to hide tears as they see them off at bus terminals.”
Mater, a free-lance journalist with Inter Press Service (IPS), was charged last September on two counts of “insulting the Turkish military,” a crime under Article 159 of the Penal Code. The prosecution was initiated at the behest of the Turkish General Staff. If convicted, she faces between two and twelve years in prison. Her publisher Samih Sokmen, also charged in the case, faces a possible fine.
The charges against Mater stem from her authorship of Mehmed’s Book: Soldiers Who Have Fought in the Southeast Speak Out. First published in April 1999, the book consists of interviews with 42 retired Turkish soldiers who fought in the civil conflict in southeastern Turkey, where the government has been fighting a bloody war with Kurdish insurgents for much of the last 15 years.
Great tradition of war correspondence
“Her writings are in the great tradition of war correspondence in that she tells the personal stories of soldiers, stories that until now had been concealed from the Turkish people,” said Arnett, a Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent best-known for his coverage of the Vietnam War and the 1990 Gulf War. “The charges against Nadire Mater should be dismissed and the ban should be lifted on this important book.”
Many of Mater’s subjects spoke about brutality, their daily fears and hardships, and their progressive disenchantment with the war. In the original indictment against Mater, prosecutors cited some 40 quotations from former conscripts as the basis for the charges.
Even before the charges were brought, an Istanbul court banned distribution of Mehmed’s Book on June 23, 1999, also under Article 159 of the Penal Code. Police subsequently confiscated unsold copies from the book’s publisher, Metis Publishers. Before the ban took effect, however, Mehmed’s Book went through four editions and sold around 9,000 copies.
“I still cannot comprehend, nor accept this ban. I cannot accept the charges,” Mater told the court today. “They [the war veterans] had remained silent for 15 years, and we the people in this country were not asking them anything,” she added. “When their narratives about their days in military service, about their lives before and after, about their expectations, loves, fear, pain, death, and resentments, in short about their whole life, were compiled in Mehmed’s Book, they hit a wall of repression and intolerance.”
Mater’s two attorneys and Sokmen, her publisher, also made defense presentations today, rebutting the charges and demanding that both defendants be acquitted. Observers had expected a verdict following today’s defense presentation; however, the head judge announced that final judgment would be postponed until September 29.
“Nadire Mater is being prosecuted because of her thoroughly professional coverage of an important news story,” said CPJ Middle East program coordinator Joel Campagna. “At the heart of this case are the dozens of laws in Turkey that can be used to criminalize free expression. Unless concrete action is taken to eliminate these laws, Turkish journalists like Mater will continue to face legal harassment and jail time when they dare to speak the truth.”
The Committee to Protect Journalists is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to the defense of press freedom everywhere.
