Arat Dink convicted...Turkey's games begin

[Joseph]

By C. ONUR ANT, Associated Press


ISTANBUL, Turkey - The son of a journalist killed earlier this year after calling the massacre of Armenians genocide was convicted Thursday of insulting Turkey's identity for republishing his father's remarks.
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Arat Dink, editor of the Armenian newspaper Agos, and publisher Serkis Seropyan each received a one-year suspended sentence for "insulting Turkishness," said their lawyer, Erdal Dogan. He said they would appeal the sentences.

Dink is the son of ethnic Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, who was convicted of the same charge for calling the killing of Armenians during World War I genocide. He had appealed the conviction when he was killed by a Turkish youth in January.

The massacre of Armenians is one of the darkest periods in Turkish history. Armenians say up to 1.5 million people were killed in 1915-17 during the Ottoman Empire, before the birth of modern Turkey.

Turkey rejects the label "genocide," maintaining that the death toll is inflated and insisting the killings occurred at a time of civil unrest.

The verdict for Dink and Seropyan came a day after legislators in the U.S. House of Representatives voted in favor of a nonbinding bill that declares the Armenian killings genocide — over Turkey's objections.

"The discriminatory mentality which turned intolerance into a state tradition has yet again declared criticism and expression of opinion an insult to Turkishness and a crime," the group Human Rights Associated said in a statement.

The European Union has pressured Turkey, which aspires to join the 27-nation bloc, to scrap the controversial law on "insulting Turkishness," saying it restricts freedom of speech.

Some Turkish leaders, including President Abdullah Gul, also believe the law has harmed Turkey's EU bid.

[Nick_A]

ISTANBUL, Turkey - The son of a journalist killed earlier this year after calling the massacre of Armenians genocide was convicted Thursday of insulting Turkey's identity for republishing his father's remarks.

The remarks were not only "insulting" but probably considered "disruptive" as well. Unfortunately he cannot be just "deleted" but could be killed.

I think the gradual depletion of our natural resources is beginning to include sanity.

[Tongue]

Arat should fear for his life after what happened to his father..

[Joseph]

Fatma Muge Gocek on Dink

Sociologists look for patterns in social behavior.**The pattern*I*observe*in the recent Turkish court decision*convicting Serkis Seropyan and Arat Dink, the owners of the*Agos newspaper, to one year imprisonment*in accordance with*the infamous Penal Code 301, for publishing an interview with Hrant Dink where he discussed the Armenian Genocide, is one of blatant discrimination based on prejudice.* Just as it had been in the previous lawsuit and subsequent sentencing against Hrant Dink.* I think this lawsuit has been brought against*Seropyan and Arat Dink*and they have been subsequently sentenced -- just as*the lawsuit previously brought against Hrant Dink leading to his sentencing --*because they are Armenians.* That is, because they are minorities in Turkey.
*
Why do*I think so?* Because the interview that Hrant Dink had given and Agos printed , the one that formed the legal grounds of the decision against Seropyan and Arat Dink, was also printed in all other Turkish media outlets.* Yet those outlets*were not targeted by either Turkish public prosecutors or by Turkish courts.* As a consequence,*those other Turkish newspapers and journalists will therefore not be targeted or gagged the way Seropyan and Arat Dink now are and will be in the future.
*
Previously, in the Hrant Dink case, while there had been many of us who had been talking critically about*the Turkish past in general and 1915 in particular, only*he from among us*was singled out and*targeted by the Turkish public prosecutor and then by the Turkish court because he was an Armenian.* He was a minority member in Turkey.* We did not go through that*entire legal process culminating in the delivery of a sentence.* I think we did not because we were ethnic Turks, and educated white Turks to boot.* While some of*us stood there watching, while*some of us tried to help Hrant Dink by conducting signature campaigns aimed at Turkish state officials foolishly thinking it would make a difference, he went through*a grueling*trial process, was found guilty, and sentenced.*
*
Hrant Dink*was sentenced*on what I consider to be trumped-up charges, after an intentional, willful*misreading and misinterpretation of what he*had written.* I would contend that not only had Hrant Dink not 'insulted Turkishness' in what he had written, but that*anybody holding a college degree*ought to have had the knowledge, intelligence or capacity to have recognized that.* Hence, in my opinion, it was a travesty of justice that a group who had the alacrity to call themselves 'deliverers of justice' reached*what I view as a shameful, illegal*decision based on untruth and prejudice.* In my mind's eye,*I shall always continue to*see that group*as 'deliverers of death'*because I think it was as a consequence of the process they set in motion, the process they sanctified with their legal decision that Hrant Dink was assassinated.*
*
Until that decision to sentence Dink was reached in Turkey, I had thought*legal systems were instituted to*protect individuals.* Yet the Hrant Dink decision taught*me that the Turkish legal system can also set individuals, especially minority members,*up for destruction by placing them as offers upon*the altar of ethnic nationalism: it would then quietly withdraw and watch some people gather 'in the name of the majority.'* These would chant ignorant songs of unity,*thus feeling superior against the unprotected.**And they certainly did.* Yes, some also stood against them and protested, but they were so few in comparison...
*
Now, today, when there*had been*many Turkish newspapers*that had also published or referred to the interview Hrant Dink had given, once again it was only the Agos*newspaper among them that was singled out and targeted by the Turkish public prosecutor and then by the Turkish court in exactly the same*manner as Hrant Dink had once been because, once again,*the people involved were Armenians.* The rest were not because they were*ethnic Turks.* And, once again,*all the other newspapers were all owned by white Turks.* Once again, Seropyan and Arat Dink are minority members in Turkey and I think that is why they alone have been convicted.
*
What are we going to do now?* Are we going to stand and watch?* Or are we going to conduct media*and signature campaigns that will lead us who knows where?*
*
At this point, I am certain of only one thing: I am sickened*at the possibility of the pattern of death repeating itself.* I am also sickened by the timing*of the Turkish court decision regarding Seropyan and Arat Dink, given the Genocide Bill that has just passed in the U.S. and given how the Turkish media, society and state are now reacting to it --*as always, emotionally and, due to lack of knowledge about the past, with vengeance.* I personally think*this conviction date*was intentionally chosen by the Turkish court to intersect with the U.S. Bill to*further foster and justify*Turkish ethnic nationalism, and that intentionality further sickens me.
*
What to do?* I look back at those signature campaigns we conducted for Hrant Dink thinking it would make a difference, thinking it would*protect him...* After all,*all of us*who signed those pleas of protection -- at least I personally -- believed that there was a*state in Turkey that somehow, somewhat upheld the delivery of justice and*the protection of the rights of all of its citizens among its fundamental principles, that is, it at least aspired toward such principles, even if it could not reach them.* What on earth was I thinking, given how the Hrant Dink trial is going at the moment, given how all attempts of Hrant Dink's lawyers to investigate and uncover the*real instigators*and culprits behind his assassination that reach deep into the Turkish state and the military are being stonewalled!* How could I have been so delusional!* There is only one thing I can think of doing at this moment: if those Turkish officials who once received our signatures and pleas about protecting Hrant Dink did nothing back then, if they just put them*aside, did not act upon or*investigate them,*I now condemn each and every one of those Turkish officials.* For in collecting those signatures, we might have deluded ourselves in relation to what the Turkish state might have been*capable of, but at least our intentions were good.* Yet those Turkish officials who, in relation to the assassination of Hrant Dink,*did not uphold the delivery of justice and the protection of all of its citizens as the fundamental principles of the Turkish state*back then and who still do not*uphold them today by enabling a full, open and transparent investigation fully, I condemn each and every one of them.* I do so*because I find their intentions foul, and their behavior*complicitous; I think those particular officials uphold and foster an*alternate vision of the Turkish state that is no different, in my view, from the state that*once condemned hundreds*of thousands of its subjects to death by deportation.**
*
I*also condemn the naturalized prejudice and the subsequent discrimination that still perseveres in Turkish society today, as it has ultimately led to the targeting of minorities in this manner.* And*I also condemn the falsified Turkish Republican history taught in school textbooks that has erased all the violence the Turkish state*once committed in the past.* Not only has that violence created the category of minorities in our society to start with, thereby fostering all this prejudice and discrimination against them, but*it has also been exploited by the same Turkish state and especially by segments of the Turkish military to create an ethnic Turkish identity, an identity which was then periodically mobilized against*the minorities both to replenish that hallowed ethnic unity and also to sustain the political status quo.
*
As*I see the same pattern that eventually led to Hrant Dink's assassination unfolding right in front of my eyes in this case, that is, in the case of Serkis Seropyan who happens to be a very dear friend of mine and of Arat Dink who*I regard as a very precious gift entrusted to us all for safekeeping by his slain father whom we obviously were not able*to protect,*I end up with a final condemnation.* I condemn and curse myself for my own present state of helplessness.
****
Fatma Muge Gocek
University of Michigan

[Alexandros]

Arat Dink


Arat Dink and Seropyan Sentenced


Arat Dink and Seropyan Sentenced Agos editor-in-chief Arat Dink and licence holder Serkis Seropyan have been given a deferred one-year prison sentence each under Article 301.

Bıa news centre

07-11-2007

Erol Önderoglu


The Sisli 2nd Penal Court has sentenced Agos editor-in-chief Arat Dink, son of murdered journalist Hrant Dink, and licence holder Serkis Seropyan to one year imprisonment each under Article 301. The sentences were deferred.


Court took "history" lessons

In its twenty-page decree the court referred to the events of 1915, saying, "If what the defendants had accused the Turks of doing was a historical truth, then their actions would have been legal"; thus, the court found it necessary to study history books itself and create its own opinion of what happened in the past.

Citing controversial Yusuf Halacoglu's book "From Exile to Genocide 2007", the court referred to historical contributions Armenians had made to Ottoman society and the fact that "there was an increase in education and teaching possibilities for Armenians".


"Transferral"

Stating that the Armenians had been preparing for an armed uprising against the Ottomans, and giving examples of armed attacks from 1895 to 1915, the court then said that the Armenians were transferred to Syria and Mosul in Northern Iraq.

The court further asked, "When, during World War I, the allies attacked German cities with air attacks, does that count as a genocide? And nuclear experiments held under oceans and ...[unreadable] resulting earthquakes, mass deaths, are they counted as scientific genocides?"


"Limitation of freedom of expression justified"

The court stated that the constitution and the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) allowed for a limitation of the freedom of expression in order to "protect national security, territorial unity or public safety, guarantee the law and prevent crimes":

"There are ECHR precendents which have deemed French legislation on freedom of expression regarding the extermination of Jews inappropriate; and the Jews in Europe never armed themselves against their own state, never united with the armies of other states, never massacred people in villages in the mountains and deep valleys, in province and district towns."

The court thus reached the conclusion that the accusation of genocide was unfair and "aimed at destroying the Turkish public order".


Great Lawyers' Union filed complaint

The court case had been opened following a complaint by Recep Akkus of the nationalist Great Lawyers' Union about an interview which Hrant Dink had done with the Reuters News Agency.

In the interview, Hrant Dink had said, "We see that with these events a people who have lived on this soil for 4,000 years are not there anymore." A further article called "A Vote against 301", which had been written about Hrant Dink's deferred six-month sentence for a series of articles on "Armenian identity" and the protest of the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) against this sentence, was also punished. After Hrant Dink's murder, the charges against him were dropped, but his son Arat Dink and licence holder Seropyan were still on trial.


No other newspaper on trial...

Other newspapers had also quoted Hrant Dink's statements, such as the Yeni Cag newspaper (six days before Agos) in an article entitled "Dink Has Not Been Brought to Senses after Appeals Court Decision", the Cumhuriyet newspaper (two days before Agos) in an article entitled "New Investigation into Dink", and the Tercüman newspaper in an article with a similar title.


Family is still threatened

Meanwhile, many news sites have reported that Arat Dink is preparing to leave Turkey for Belgium with his wife and two children. It is said that he is leaving his post at Agos and, reacting to the many threats he and his family are receiving, moving abroad. The Dink family has said that this is a temporary measure. (EÖ/AG)

source

[1.5 million]

The Turks have flipped out...totally over the deep end...here we see a Turkish court officially sanctioning the concept that underground nuclear tests (by some unamed entity) have caused the 1999? earthquake in Turkey and the Turks consider this to be a genocide against them. Think about this for a bit.

Also they should get major xxxxx slapped for this conviction and their justifications: "If only what the defendents had accused the Turks were true then it would be perfectly legal" ....etc