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Agence France Presse
October 22, 2008 Wednesday 12:51 PM GMT
Turkish policemen cleared over pictures of journalist's killer
ANKARA, Oct 22 2008
Two Turkish policemen were Wednesday acquitted over a scandal in which
security forces posed for pictures with the suspected killer of
Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, the Anatolia news agency said.
The court verdict will be a disappointment for Dink's family who say
police protected the self-confessed killer, Ogun Samast, when he was
seized in the northern city of Samsun a day after Dink was shot dead
in Istanbul last year.
Footage and photos leaked to the media at the time showed officers,
some in uniform, posing with Samast, aged 17 at the time, as he held a
Turkish flag, triggering accusations that some officials secretly
approved of the murder.
Eight police officiers were given disciplinary sanctions at the time,
but only Metin Balta, the deputy head of the terrorism department, and
Ibrahim Firat, a police chief in the same office, were brought to
court.
At the end of a trial which lasted a little over a year, the court in
Samsun ruled that Balta was not guilty of "abusing his office by
allowing acts unbefitting state officials and leading to the
impression that there was sympathy" for Samast's action, the report
said.
The court also acquitted Firat on the ground that there was no "solid
and convincing" evidence to convict him of "violating the secrecy of
the investigation" by leaking the images to the media, it added.
Dink, 52, hated by Turkish nationalists for calling the World War I
massacres of Armenians a genocide, was gunned down on January 19,
2007, outside the offices of his Agos newspaper in central Istanbul.
Samast and 18 accomplices went on trial in Istanbul last year.
The charge-sheet says police received intelligence as early as 2006 of
a plot organised in the northern city of Trabzon, Samast's hometown,
to kill Dink.
Two soldiers -- members of the Trabzon gendarmerie intelligence
department -- were put on trial in January on charges of covering up
intelligence about the murder plot.
They testified in court in March that they had passed on to their
superiors information of a plot to kill Dink, but said no action was
taken.
They also accused their superiors of fabricating documents after the
murder to create the impression they had no prior knowledge of the
plot.
The trial is seen as a test of Ankara's resolve to eliminate the "deep
state" -- a term used to describe security forces acting outside the
law to preserve what they consider Turkey's best interests.
October 22, 2008 Wednesday 12:51 PM GMT
Turkish policemen cleared over pictures of journalist's killer
ANKARA, Oct 22 2008
Two Turkish policemen were Wednesday acquitted over a scandal in which
security forces posed for pictures with the suspected killer of
Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, the Anatolia news agency said.
The court verdict will be a disappointment for Dink's family who say
police protected the self-confessed killer, Ogun Samast, when he was
seized in the northern city of Samsun a day after Dink was shot dead
in Istanbul last year.
Footage and photos leaked to the media at the time showed officers,
some in uniform, posing with Samast, aged 17 at the time, as he held a
Turkish flag, triggering accusations that some officials secretly
approved of the murder.
Eight police officiers were given disciplinary sanctions at the time,
but only Metin Balta, the deputy head of the terrorism department, and
Ibrahim Firat, a police chief in the same office, were brought to
court.
At the end of a trial which lasted a little over a year, the court in
Samsun ruled that Balta was not guilty of "abusing his office by
allowing acts unbefitting state officials and leading to the
impression that there was sympathy" for Samast's action, the report
said.
The court also acquitted Firat on the ground that there was no "solid
and convincing" evidence to convict him of "violating the secrecy of
the investigation" by leaking the images to the media, it added.
Dink, 52, hated by Turkish nationalists for calling the World War I
massacres of Armenians a genocide, was gunned down on January 19,
2007, outside the offices of his Agos newspaper in central Istanbul.
Samast and 18 accomplices went on trial in Istanbul last year.
The charge-sheet says police received intelligence as early as 2006 of
a plot organised in the northern city of Trabzon, Samast's hometown,
to kill Dink.
Two soldiers -- members of the Trabzon gendarmerie intelligence
department -- were put on trial in January on charges of covering up
intelligence about the murder plot.
They testified in court in March that they had passed on to their
superiors information of a plot to kill Dink, but said no action was
taken.
They also accused their superiors of fabricating documents after the
murder to create the impression they had no prior knowledge of the
plot.
The trial is seen as a test of Ankara's resolve to eliminate the "deep
state" -- a term used to describe security forces acting outside the
law to preserve what they consider Turkey's best interests.