International Herald Tribune, France
Jan 26 2007
Turkish authorities charge 6th suspect in ethnic Armenian
journalist’s killing
The Associated PressPublished: January 26, 2007
ISTANBUL, Turkey: Turkish authorities charged a sixth suspect Friday
in the slaying of prominent ethnic Armenian journalist Hrant Dink,
police said.
Dink, who spoke out about the mass killings of Armenians in the early
20th century, was gunned down outside his newspaper a week ago in a
killing that raised fears that Turkey may continue to be a dangerous
place for intellectuals who openly express their ideas.
University student Erhan Tuncel was formally arrested Friday on
charges of instigating the killing, at the end of the legal four-day
detention period, police said. A seventh suspect, detained along with
Tuncel, was released without being charged.
Five other suspects, including alleged gunman Ogun Samast and Yasin
Hayal, a nationalist militant who served time in prison for a 2004
attack and who police say confessed to inciting the slaying and to
providing a gun and money to Samast, were charged Wednesday.
Also Friday, the government sacked the governor and the police chief
of the Black Sea city of Trabzon, where all the suspects were based.
Both men had come under criticism after Dink’s killing for allegedly
not closely surveilling Hayal despite his conviction for bombing a
McDonald’s restaurant in 2004.
It was in their city last year that Rev. Andrea Santoro, a
60-year-old Italian Catholic priest, was shot dead by an apparently
Islamist youth angered by the publication in Europe of cartoons of
the Prophet Muhammad.
Authorities, meanwhile, launched a separate investigation into Hayal
for what appeared to be a threat against Nobel Prize-winning novelist
Orhan Pamuk – who like Dink has been vocal about the killings of
Armenians, police said.
Hayal shouted: "Orhan Pamuk, be smart! Be smart!" as he was being
brought to an Istanbul courtroom with his hands cuffed behind his
back Wednesday. The investigation could lead to Hayal’s prosecution
if it concludes that his words amounted to a threat against the
novelist.
Dink, the 52-year-old editor of the bilingual Ago newspaper, had been
brought to trial numerous times for allegedly "insulting
Turkishness," a crime under Turkey’s penal code.
Pamuk, who won the Nobel Prize in literature last year, also had
faced trial in Turkey for his comments on the Armenian killings and
had been accused of treason for doing so. His case was thrown out on
a technicality.
Dink’s murder inspired a massive outpouring of support for liberal
values, including freedom of expression, tolerance and reconciliation
between Armenians and Turks,
But the killing also pointed to Turkey’s continuing problems with
extreme nationalism. Most Turks suspect the killing might be linked
to ultra-nationalist groups.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
