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  • Turkish Media Comes Under Legal Pressure

    TURKISH MEDIA COMES UNDER LEGAL PRESSURE
    By EROL ISRAFIL

    Atlanta Journal Constitution
    http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/turkish-media-comes-under-692470.html
    Oct 26 2010
    ISTANBUL

    These days, Busra Erdal wears two hats on her trips to Turkish
    courts. She writes for a newspaper, mainly about the trials of
    suspected coup plotters. And she defends herself - in about 60
    cases that claim she broke confidentiality codes and other laws in
    her stories.

    It's a tale of modern Turkey, a democracy with authoritarian roots,
    and an Islamic-leaning government in a power struggle with secular
    elites linked to the military and judiciary. It's about limits on
    expression in a nation seeking to join the European Union, and a
    combative culture in which media groups slide into the political fray,
    by design or default.

    "Thoughts constantly circle in my head. What if I go to jail? Why am
    I doing this job?" Erdal, 29, said in a rapid but low-key tone during
    an interview in an Istanbul cafe.

    Over the past year, there has been an upswing in cases filed by
    state prosecutors against Turkish media, many related to trials
    of alleged networks of hardline secularists, including police and
    military officers, suspected of conspiring against Prime Minister
    Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

    The legal flurry comes amid tension between the government and the
    judicial establishment, both of which have sparred with their media
    critics, which in turn benefit from leaks by inside sources that
    possibly have a political agenda.

    A farmer's daughter, Erdal moved to Istanbul to study law as a teenager
    and works for Zaman, a major newspaper whose editorial line is loyal
    to the government. Erdal is accused of attempting to influence the
    outcome of a fair trial and violating the confidentiality of an
    investigation. She believes she's being targeted because her stories
    are viewed as damaging to the reputation of the courts and defendants.

    The charges carry a penalty of several years in jail, though Erdal
    hopes any punishment can be reduced to a fine.

    In a report last week, Reporters Without Borders ranked Turkey
    at 138th out of 178 countries on its press freedom index, citing
    "the frenzied proliferation of lawsuits, incarcerations, and court
    sentencing targeting journalists."

    The Paris-based group said many of those targeted were Kurdish or
    journalists covering the conflict between the Turkish state and
    members of its ethnic Kurd minority. Under an anti-terror law, Namik
    Durukan of Milliyet newspaper faces up to seven-and-a-half years in
    prison for writing about a Kurdish rebel statement that was posted
    on the Internet.

    Bianet, an Istanbul-based group that monitors Turkish media, said
    five journalists were in jail in connection with their work, and
    another 30 were imprisoned on unrelated charges. One of the most
    prominent is Mustafa Balbay, a columnist for Cumhuriyet newspaper
    and a fierce government critic who is charged with attempting to
    overthrow the government.

    The government views Balbay as a case unrelated to press freedom. But
    in an implicit criticism of its foes in the judiciary, it has
    acknowledged shortcomings in free expression despite progress on some
    democratic reforms needed for EU entry.

    "Recently, I also took note of the high amount of cases against
    journalists and the conflicting manner in which some of these cases
    are made," President Abdullah Gul said last week. "I am sure that once
    these cases get to court, all of the mistakes will be fixed. Press
    freedom concerns the prestige of a country and is an indication of
    how transparent that country is."

    Sedat Ergin, a columnist for Hurriyet newspaper, said many cases
    involved Article 285 of the Turkish criminal code, under which judges
    have barred media reports on an investigation until a court accepts
    an indictment. He argued for a legal amendment to give the media
    more latitude, while some journalists have said judges are simply
    interpreting a sound law in too strict a manner.

    Ergin said such prosecuting the press affects "all newspapers,
    across the board," but he also singled out pro-government media for
    criticism, citing "underreporting" of alleged corruption in official
    circles. Massive tax fines against the Dogan business group, whose
    secular-oriented media outlets include Hurriyet, were viewed by some
    as a government-engineered attack on press critics.

    Two major trials of alleged coup plotting gangs, dubbed Ergenekon
    and Balyoz, symbolize the divide between the elected government and a
    diminished opposition. While Erdogan says the trials are a step toward
    reform, opponents counter that it has netted innocents as part of a
    broader plan to muzzle dissent and undermine Turkey's secular legacy.

    The Justice Ministry has reported the filing of more than 4,000 cases
    of alleged violations of an investigation's secrecy in connection with
    Ergenekon, which takes its name from a legendary valley in Central
    Asia believed to be the Turks' ancestral homeland.

    Ahmet Sik, a journalism professor at Bilgi University in Istanbul,
    is on trial for a book he co-authored about Ergenekon, and claims
    the allegations are flimsy because he obtained information from open
    sources. He also said a lack of objectivity in some Turkish journalism
    contributed to political polarization.

    "It can be a very sticky situation for journalists, and you can easily
    get caught in the cross-fire of accusations and suspicions," Sik said.

    "It is absolutely shocking that Turkey is experiencing all of this,
    while at the same time you hear speeches about law being standardized
    according to the EU."

    In the past, Erdogan was quick to launch defamation suits, including
    one against a Cumhuriyet cartoonist who drew the prime minister as a
    cat entangled in yarn. But his government has also taken steps toward
    greater freedom of expression in Turkey.

    In 2008, the government amended a law that banned insults to Turkish
    identity to require the approval of the justice ministry to file
    a case. The law, now rarely used, shaped the prosecution of Nobel
    laureate Orhan Pamuk for statements on the massacres of Armenians
    in the early 20th century, as well as Hrant Dink, an ethnic Armenian
    journalist who was fatally shot in 2007.

    The government has also pledged to ease some Internet censorship.

    Turkey banned access to YouTube, the video-sharing site, in 2008 after
    users complained that some videos broke Turkish law by insulting the
    memory of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the national founder who imposed a
    secular vision after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.

    The editorial view of Zaman newspaper is sometimes apparent in its
    reporting on the coup plot trials. A headline on a story by Erdal,
    its journalist, says one group of judges is "breaking the law."

    Erdal said state prosecutors lodged one case against her because she
    reported the names of judges investigating a retired army general.

    During the AP interview, she dabbed at tears when describing how she
    was insulted - "the worst thing you can call a woman" - by a courthouse
    heckler. But she also laughed, recalling a judge's surprise when she
    was mistakenly summoned to testify as a witness in a case involving
    a union.

    "He told me that there was a mistake and jokingly said, 'Well, you've
    been here so many times that we now consider you a staff witness'"
    Erdal said. "I guess they just automatically pasted my name on the
    document without paying attention."




    From: A. Papazian
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