8 Jun 2010 | Index Index, minipost, News and features
Two employees of Turkey’s Express periodical have been convicted of “making propaganda for a terrorist organisation”. Journalist Irfan Aktan was sentenced to 15 months in prison while editorial manager Merve Erol was fined TL 16,000 (€ 8,000). The charges stem from an article published last September entitled “Weather conditions in the Qandil region/No solution without fighting”. The Qandil mountains are home to camps run by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) and several high-ranking members of the militant organisation. The journalists’ defence argued the article was written at a time when the discussions about the Kurdish initiative had just started and when PKK members had started to surrender.
26 May 2010 | Index Index, minipost
A Turkish student has received an 11-month suspended jail sentence after posting a cartoon of the local mayor on Facebook. Erdem Büyük, 22, of the northwestern city of Eskisehir, was arrested, interrogated after loading a cartoon of Yilmaz Bûyükersen onto the site. He has been found guilty of defamation under article 125 of the Turkish criminal code. Büyük told reporters that he shared the cartoon because he “really liked it” but had “no intention of attacking the mayor”. The sentence has been postponed for 5 years, but will be executed if the student repeats the offense. Büyük’s lawyer said today that they intend to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights.
13 May 2010 | Index Index, minipost
On 7 May, two newspaper employees were fined over an article criticising the Turkish army’s system of patronage. Over 300 army generals sued the pro-Islamic Vakit newspaper for libel over an article entitled “The country where people who cannot become corporals become generals”. Haron Aksoy and Nuri Aykon were fined TL616,000 (£275,000) for the 2003 article.
In other news, an Istanbul court sentenced two journalists for spreading terrorist propaganda. İrfan Aktan was handed a five-year prison sentence and Merve Erol received a heavy fine for “spreading propaganda for an illegal organisation” over an article for the Express newspaper.
29 Apr 2010 | Index Index, minipost, Uncategorized
Selim Sadak, mayor of the city of Siirt in south-eastern Turkey, was sentenced to 1 year’s imprisonment on 26 April after being found guilty of “spreading PKK propaganda”. Sadak’s conviction is came after he used the term “Kurdiastan” in a statement given to a journalist.
