8 Feb 2013 | Turkey
There has been a significant decrease in the number of cases brought under Turkey’s infamous Article 301, a recent news investigation has shown. But the law continues to be rigorously implemented.
The original version of Article 301 made it illegal to insult “Turkey, the Turkish ethnicity, or Turkish government institutions”. This was changed in 2008 when the phrase “Turkish ethnicity” was replaced by “the Turkish nation”.
The amendment also set conditions for court cases, making the permission of the Justice Ministry mandatory for complaints to be turned into court cases.
According to a report published in newspaper Taraf last week, a total of 3,019 requests were sent to the Justice Ministry between 2008 and January 2013. Although the number remains significant, it also points to a decrease when viewed on a year-by-year basis.
In 2008, a total of 559 requests were sent to the ministry. This fell to 518 in 2009. In 2010 the number of requests was 403, which fell to 324 in 2011. In 2012, a total of 287 requests were sent to the ministry.
Between 2008 and January 2013 the Justice Ministry allowed 105 of the 3,019 requests to come to court. The percentage of cases allowed to be opened was 5.77.
The General Staff of the armed forces was among the state institutions which filed complaints. A total number of 37 requests were sent from the General Staff to the Justice Ministry.
The news of the decrease in the number of Article 301 cases came in a week when the Turkish parliament discussed proposed changes in the new Turkish constitution.
If accepted, the draft new constitution will alter the definition of national identity by changing the phrase “Turkish citizenship” to “citizenship of the Republic of Turkey”. This seems in line with the amendment made to Article 301, and extends the definition of citizenship to include all ethnic groups in the country.
1 Feb 2013 | Turkey
Fifteen years after she was detained for allegedly perpetrating a terrorist attack in Istanbul’s Spice Bazaar, and eleven years after she was acquitted of those charges, the Turkish sociologist Pınar Selek again found herself on the wrong side of the law when Turkey’s High Court sentenced her to aggravated life imprisonment last week. The Court issued an arrest warrant, which was sent to Interpol, since Selek is living in Strasbourg, where she is pursuing her doctoral studies.
Turkish sociologist Pınar Selek has been sentenced to life in prison
Selek’s court case had been controversial from the beginning. The attack with which she was originally charged, which killed seven people and injured 127, came at a time when the conflict between Turkey and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party was at its peak. For some months after the event took place, the media reported that the explosion was caused by a gas leak.
But this account of events changed when Turkish police detained a Kurdish man who, it was claimed, had been responsible for preparing a bomb. He mentioned Selek’s name while in custody and confessed to preparing together with her the bomb which he then placed in the Bazaar.
At the time of her detention Selek had been researching Turkey’s minorities and politically marginalised groups. During her interrogation she was asked to reveal the names of persons she interviewed while working on her studies. She said she was subjected to torture and it was later revealed that the deposition of the first man had also been taken under torture. Months after his interrogation, the man denied even knowing Selek.
He was released and so was Selek, but only after spending two-and-a-half years in prison.
According to the prosecutor’s initial reports, there was evidence showing the explosion was caused by a bomb. Later, Istanbul University’s Analytic Chemistry Department and Cerrahpaşa Medical Faculty’s Forensic Departments issued reports challenging that version of events, having concluded that the explosion was resulted by a gas leak.
The case went back and forth from one court to another. In the course of 11 years following her first acquittal Selek was acquitted two more times before being sentenced again on 24 January. The history of the case had become so complicated that it began to sound like a story straight from the pages of Dickens’s Bleak House.
Life imprisonment is currently the most serious sentence in Turkey after the country abolished capital punishment in peacetime in 2002. Selek’s lawyers appealed the sentence on Tuesday and said they would bring the case to European Court of Human Rights.
Writing in the Al-Monitor website, Turkish columnist Cengiz Çandar argued that Selek’s case would go down in history as a notorious example of judicial miscarriage and compared it to France’s notorious Dreyfus affair.
“The story of the trial, known as the Pınar Selek case, easily dwarfs the Dreyfus case in comparison,” he wrote.
23 Jan 2013 | Uncategorized
A magazine editor in Thailand has been sentenced to 11 years in jail today (23 January) for insulting the monarchy. Somyot Prueksakasemsuk was found guilty of violating Thailand’s lese majeste laws, after he printed two articles in his magazine Voice of Taksin featuring comments deemed insulting to the royal family by prosecutors. Prueksakasemsuk’s arrest on 30 April 2011 came five days after he launched a petition campaigning to reform article 112 of Thailand’s penal code, making it an offence to defame the monarchy — a sentence which imposes prison sentences between three to 15 years. The author of both articles, Jakrapob Penkair, former spokesperson for Thaksin, is living in exile in Cambodia and has not been charged.
Basil Fawlty in Fawlty Towers – Censored by the BBC for using racially sensitive terms
Nine human rights lawyers have been jailed in Turkey. On 22 January, Istanbul court ordered the pre-trial detention of nine of 12 lawyers arrested on terrorism charges on 18 and 20 January. Güçlü Sevimli, Barkın Timtik, Şükriye Erden, Naciye Demir, Nazan Betül Vangölü Kozağaçlı, Taylan Tanay, Ebru Timtik, Günay Dağ, Selçuk Kozağaçlı have been jailed whilst a further three were freed. Prosecutors could decide to try the group as part of a wider investigation against people suspected of being involved with the armed and outlawed Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front. The group has carried out attacks on the military, politicians and the police in the past. The jailed lawyers had been particularly active in defending against police brutality in the past, as well as defending human rights activists in court. A secrecy order on the investigation means specific charges are unclear.
The Nigerian government has banned state officials from talking to the press. On 21 January, Lagos authorities issued a notice barring civil servants and political offices from granting interviews or speaking on the government’s behalf. The notice sent from Governor Babatunde Fashola was intended to curb the flow of information to the public, saying that policies that had not yet been formally approved were being discussed with the media. The notice ordered all government workers to request permission from the Ministry of Information and Strategy before giving interviews, so the information could be edited by the ministry prior to its release to the public. It also warned that in the event of officials offering public speeches, they must stick solely to their planned speech which would have to be approved by the ministry prior to the event.
Pakistan has imposed a ban on the sale of the video games Call of Duty and Medal of Honour. Saleem Memon, president of the All Pakistan CD, DVD, Audio Cassette Traders and Manufacturers Association, released a statement calling for the boycott of the games after they received dozens of complaints, saying that they violate the country’s unity and sanctity. Memon said “Call of Duty: Black Ops II” and “Medal of Honor: Warfighter” depict Pakistan’s intelligence agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISS), as pro-Al Qaeda and Pakistan as a broken state and a safe haven for terrorists. Shopkeepers have been warned of the “consequences” of being caught attempting to buy or sell either of the games.
Famed scenes of Fawlty Towers have been cut by the BBC, to protect racial sensitivities. The Germans, an episode of the popular 1970s TV series was repeated on 20 January on BBC2, with a scene from the bigoted Major Gowen edited. Racist language was removed from the clip, a move taken to keep in tune with a shift in public attitudes according to the BBC, but listener complaints were filed following the broadcast, with some remarking that it was an “airbrushing of history”. The episode satirises xenophobia in its different forms and features John Cleese’s famous “Hitler walk” — a scene considered to be one of the greatest moments on British television.
11 Jan 2013 | Middle East and North Africa
Kaya Genç looks at how Turkey’s “first truly liberal newspaper” has shaken up the country’s media
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