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ANKARA: Third Hearing In Dink Murder Trial To Be Held Today

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  • ANKARA: Third Hearing In Dink Murder Trial To Be Held Today

    THIRD HEARING IN DINK MURDER TRIAL TO BE HELD TODAY

    Today's Zaman
    Feb 11 2008
    Turkey

    The third hearing in the trial of defendants accused of assassinating
    Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, killed in January of last
    year by an ultranationalist youth for allegedly insulting Turkishness,
    will take place today.

    A total of 18 suspects, including Dink's suspected killer, 17-year-old
    O.S., and an ultranationalist youth charged with planning the crime,
    will go on trial for organizing the horrendous murder, at the 14th
    High Criminal Court in Ýstanbul.

    Dink was gunned down in broad daylight on Jan. 19 in front of
    the headquarters of bilingual Armenian weekly Agos, where he was
    editor-in-chief. Following Dink's murder, many reports suggested that
    the police were tipped off about the planned assassination more than
    once prior to his execution yet failed to prevent it. In addition,
    links have emerged among members of the security forces in Trabzon,
    where the killing was planned, in Ýstanbul where it was executed and
    in Ankara, where the intelligence was gathered, and the masterminds
    of the murder.

    Sources say the session will be recorded by cameras set up in the
    courtroom that will record video as well as the conversations between
    defendants and lawyers during the trial.

    Dink family lawyers applied to the Ýstanbul Public Prosecutor's Office
    after the second hearing of the trial resumed in early October 2007
    and accused security officers of covering up intelligence and evidence
    on the slaying. The Ýstanbul Public Prosecutor's Office then ordered
    cameras to be set up in the courtroom to record the hearing.

    The second hearing of suspects accused of murdering Dink was held on
    Oct. 1, 2007 at the Ýstanbul 14th Criminal Court in Beþiktaþ. O.S.

    expressed "regret" for the killing in his testimony.

    "I was forced to do this job. I shot Dink out of fear without even
    understanding how it happened. I was at my uncle's place when I came
    back to my senses. I could not sleep the entire night. I regret it;
    I didn't know he had a family. I wouldn't have done it if I had known,"
    he said in his testimony.

    The Ýstanbul Public Prosecutor is expected to ask the court to sentence
    Yasin Hayal, an ultranationalist youth charged with planning the
    murder, to life imprisonment under hard conditions, O.S. to 42 years
    in jail and the other 16 suspects to prison terms varying between 15
    and 35 years.

    Fethiye Cetin, an attorney representing the Dink family, has said on
    the other hand that the murder has not been properly investigated,
    expressing fear about the court's independence. "No significant
    distance has been covered in the investigation launched into Dink's
    assassination. It is not possible to dissipate the shroud of mist
    behind his death unless a deeper probe is launched into his murder,"
    she said in a report submitted to the Interior Ministry.

    --Boundary_(ID_alxJkVGXPwk/UeW1fJgHgw)- -
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