"Wave of Accusations for 'Insulting Turkishness' Reached Taner Akcam":

YEREVAN / 10 January 2007

Turkey has officially launched an investigation against Taner Akçam, the first Turkish intellectual to recognize the Armenian Genocide as such, thus ‘insulting Turkishness', reports The Armenian Reporter, referring to Turkish magazine The Radikal, according to PanARMENIAN.Net. The Istanbul newspaper Radikal has reported that an official investigation has been opened against University of Minnesota Akçam, who claims that, the Armenian deportations of 1915 and following constituted genocide. Radikal broke the story on January 9, 2007.

In an October 6, 2006, newspaper column in the Turkish Armenian journal Agos, Akçam criticized the prosecution of Agos managing editor Hrant Dink for using the term `genocide,' thereby `insulting Turkishness' under the notorious Article 301 of Turkey's penal code. Highlighting the term `genocide,' Akçam declared himself an accessory to the charges against Dink, and urged readers to join in Dink's support.

Akçam is the author of A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility, which has been widely and positively reviewed in the United States, and has brought a great deal of public attention lately to the author and the subject of the Armenian Genocide