Leading Turkish newspaper’s journalists face terror charges
istanbul — Directors and journalists from one of Turkey’s most respected opposition newspapers went on trial on Monday in a case which has raised new alarm over press freedoms under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The defendants from the Cumhuriyet daily were detained from October last year under a state of emergency imposed after the July 2016 failed coup blamed on USbased preacher Fethullah Gulen and charged with terror-related offences.
A total of 17 Cumhuriyet staff — including writers, cartoonists and executives — went on trial at the imposing palace of justice in Istanbul inside a courtroom crammed with supporters, an AFP journalist said.
Supporters released dozens of multicoloured balloons outside the courthouse, chanting: “Don’t be silenced! A free media is a right!”
If convicted, the defendants face varying terms of up to 43 years in jail.
The opposition fears the state of emergency has been used to go after anyone who dares defy the government and the trial is seen as a
This trial is a test for Turkey. erdogan says justice is balanced in Turkey. Now we will see. Aydin Engin, a writer on trial
test for press freedom under Erdogan. Turkey ranks 155th on the latest Reporters Without Borders (RSF) world press freedom index, below Belarus and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
According to the P24 press freedom group, there are 166 journalists behind bars in Turkey, most of whom were arrested under the state of emergency.
Erdogan, however, insisted in an interview earlier this month there were just “two real journalists” be- hind bars in Turkey. In an extraordinary coincidence, the trial opened on Turkey’s annual national day of the press, marking the end of censorship in the Ottoman Empire in 1908.
Cumhuriyet (Republic), which was set up in 1924 and is Turkey’s oldest mainstream national title, has been a thorn in the side of Erdogan in recent years.
Those appearing in court include some of the best known names in Turkish journalism including the columnist Kadri Gursel, the paper’s editor-in-chief Murat Sabuncu and the respected cartoonist Musa Kart. Also being tried in the case is the investigative journalist Ahmet Sik who in 2011 wrote an explosive book “The Imam’s Army” exposing the grip Gulen’s movement had on the Turkish state.
“This trial is a test for Turkey,” Aydin Engin, one of the writers on trial who was freed after his initial arrest. “Erdogan says justice is balanced in Turkey. Now we will see.”
Being tried in absentia is the paper’s former editor-in-chief Can Dundar, who was last year sentenced to five years and 10 months in jail over a front-page story accusing the government of sending weapons to Syria. —