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Hurriyet, Turkey
Aug 26 2011
Court insists on phone records in Dink case
Friday, August 26, 2011
VERCİHAN ZİFLİOĞLU
ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News
An Istanbul court hearing the Hrant Dink murder trial has again asked
for the records of all cell-phone conversations made in the area at
the time of the journalist's assassination following the
Telecommunications Directorate, or TİB's, earlier refusal to grant the
request.
"All administrative corporations do whatever they can so that we can't
obtain information - the TİB is just a part of this process," Hakan
Bakırcı, one of the Dink family's lawyers, recently told the Hürriyet
Daily News, adding that it was difficult to make headway in the case.
Despite the past problems, Bakırcı praised the court for again
insisting on collecting more evidence.
TİB refused the court's first request on the grounds that issuing all
the phone records would be "a violation of the privacy of private
lives."
The court is trying to determine whether two suspicious people
recorded by security cameras talking to each other at the murder scene
were connected to the journalist's murder. Mobile phone base records
can show all phone activities of an area at a given time, and Dink
lawyers have officially demanded the records from the GSM operators.
One of the operating companies responded to the request saying there
were no mobile phone calls made during those hours, while another
answered that there was no base station in the area, even though the
murder occurred in one of the most populous districts of the city.
TİB subsequently entered the discussion and said handing over the
records would be a violation of private lives.
Dink, a Turkish journalist of Armenian origin, was the chief editor
for weekly Agos, a paper published in both Turkish and Armenian. He
was shot in front of his Istanbul office in January 2007; his
self-confessed murderer Ogün Samast was sentenced to 22 years last
month.
Official policy of denial
Dink's friend and an editor in Agos, Pakrad Öztukyan, said he believed
TİB resisted handing over the records because of the risk of much
deeper connections being disclosed.
The Dink case will never end, Öztukyan said. "This case has such a
dark background that it might as well be connected to the Ergenekon
case."
Another close friend of Dink, Zakaria Mildanoğlu, said: "This is an
open example of the denial policy of the state and the government in
Turkey that comes from the past. Naturally, TİB is an extension of all
these policies. The governor who called Hrant to his office and
threatened him was promoted instead of being punished. So was the
Istanbul Security Chief. If the prime minister genuinely wanted the
case to be justly solved, he wouldn't have promoted [these people]."
An Istanbul court hearing the Hrant Dink murder trial has again asked
for the records of all cell-phone conversations made in the area at
the time of the journalist's assassination following the
Telecommunications Directorate, or TİB's, earlier refusal to grant the
request.
"All administrative corporations do whatever they can so that we can't
obtain information - the TİB is just a part of this process," Hakan
Bakırcı, one of the Dink family's lawyers, recently told the Hürriyet
Daily News, adding that it was difficult to make headway in the case.
Despite the past problems, Bakırcı praised the court for again
insisting on collecting more evidence.
TİB refused the court's first request on the grounds that issuing all
the phone records would be "a violation of the privacy of private
lives."
The court is trying to determine whether two suspicious people
recorded by security cameras talking to each other at the murder scene
were connected to the journalist's murder. Mobile phone base records
can show all phone activities of an area at a given time, and Dink
lawyers have officially demanded the records from the GSM operators.
One of the operating companies responded to the request saying there
were no mobile phone calls made during those hours, while another
answered that there was no base station in the area, even though the
murder occurred in one of the most populous districts of the city.
TİB subsequently entered the discussion and said handing over the
records would be a violation of private lives.
Dink, a Turkish journalist of Armenian origin, was the chief editor
for weekly Agos, a paper published in both Turkish and Armenian. He
was shot in front of his Istanbul office in January 2007; his
self-confessed murderer Ogün Samast was sentenced to 22 years last
month.
Official policy of denial
Dink's friend and an editor in Agos, Pakrad Öztukyan, said he believed
TİB resisted handing over the records because of the risk of much
deeper connections being disclosed.
The Dink case will never end, Öztukyan said. "This case has such a
dark background that it might as well be connected to the Ergenekon
case."
Another close friend of Dink, Zakaria Mildanoğlu, said: "This is an
open example of the denial policy of the state and the government in
Turkey that comes from the past. Naturally, TİB is an extension of all
these policies. The governor who called Hrant to his office and
threatened him was promoted instead of being punished. So was the
Istanbul Security Chief. If the prime minister genuinely wanted the
case to be justly solved, he wouldn't have promoted [these people]."
Aug 26 2011
Court insists on phone records in Dink case
Friday, August 26, 2011
VERCİHAN ZİFLİOĞLU
ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News
An Istanbul court hearing the Hrant Dink murder trial has again asked
for the records of all cell-phone conversations made in the area at
the time of the journalist's assassination following the
Telecommunications Directorate, or TİB's, earlier refusal to grant the
request.
"All administrative corporations do whatever they can so that we can't
obtain information - the TİB is just a part of this process," Hakan
Bakırcı, one of the Dink family's lawyers, recently told the Hürriyet
Daily News, adding that it was difficult to make headway in the case.
Despite the past problems, Bakırcı praised the court for again
insisting on collecting more evidence.
TİB refused the court's first request on the grounds that issuing all
the phone records would be "a violation of the privacy of private
lives."
The court is trying to determine whether two suspicious people
recorded by security cameras talking to each other at the murder scene
were connected to the journalist's murder. Mobile phone base records
can show all phone activities of an area at a given time, and Dink
lawyers have officially demanded the records from the GSM operators.
One of the operating companies responded to the request saying there
were no mobile phone calls made during those hours, while another
answered that there was no base station in the area, even though the
murder occurred in one of the most populous districts of the city.
TİB subsequently entered the discussion and said handing over the
records would be a violation of private lives.
Dink, a Turkish journalist of Armenian origin, was the chief editor
for weekly Agos, a paper published in both Turkish and Armenian. He
was shot in front of his Istanbul office in January 2007; his
self-confessed murderer Ogün Samast was sentenced to 22 years last
month.
Official policy of denial
Dink's friend and an editor in Agos, Pakrad Öztukyan, said he believed
TİB resisted handing over the records because of the risk of much
deeper connections being disclosed.
The Dink case will never end, Öztukyan said. "This case has such a
dark background that it might as well be connected to the Ergenekon
case."
Another close friend of Dink, Zakaria Mildanoğlu, said: "This is an
open example of the denial policy of the state and the government in
Turkey that comes from the past. Naturally, TİB is an extension of all
these policies. The governor who called Hrant to his office and
threatened him was promoted instead of being punished. So was the
Istanbul Security Chief. If the prime minister genuinely wanted the
case to be justly solved, he wouldn't have promoted [these people]."
An Istanbul court hearing the Hrant Dink murder trial has again asked
for the records of all cell-phone conversations made in the area at
the time of the journalist's assassination following the
Telecommunications Directorate, or TİB's, earlier refusal to grant the
request.
"All administrative corporations do whatever they can so that we can't
obtain information - the TİB is just a part of this process," Hakan
Bakırcı, one of the Dink family's lawyers, recently told the Hürriyet
Daily News, adding that it was difficult to make headway in the case.
Despite the past problems, Bakırcı praised the court for again
insisting on collecting more evidence.
TİB refused the court's first request on the grounds that issuing all
the phone records would be "a violation of the privacy of private
lives."
The court is trying to determine whether two suspicious people
recorded by security cameras talking to each other at the murder scene
were connected to the journalist's murder. Mobile phone base records
can show all phone activities of an area at a given time, and Dink
lawyers have officially demanded the records from the GSM operators.
One of the operating companies responded to the request saying there
were no mobile phone calls made during those hours, while another
answered that there was no base station in the area, even though the
murder occurred in one of the most populous districts of the city.
TİB subsequently entered the discussion and said handing over the
records would be a violation of private lives.
Dink, a Turkish journalist of Armenian origin, was the chief editor
for weekly Agos, a paper published in both Turkish and Armenian. He
was shot in front of his Istanbul office in January 2007; his
self-confessed murderer Ogün Samast was sentenced to 22 years last
month.
Official policy of denial
Dink's friend and an editor in Agos, Pakrad Öztukyan, said he believed
TİB resisted handing over the records because of the risk of much
deeper connections being disclosed.
The Dink case will never end, Öztukyan said. "This case has such a
dark background that it might as well be connected to the Ergenekon
case."
Another close friend of Dink, Zakaria Mildanoğlu, said: "This is an
open example of the denial policy of the state and the government in
Turkey that comes from the past. Naturally, TİB is an extension of all
these policies. The governor who called Hrant to his office and
threatened him was promoted instead of being punished. So was the
Istanbul Security Chief. If the prime minister genuinely wanted the
case to be justly solved, he wouldn't have promoted [these people]."