TURKISH SCHOLAR SUES TO OVERTURN LAW ON ‘DENIGRATING TURKISHNESS’
Chronicle of Higher Education
urkish-scholar-sues-to-overturn-law-on-denigrating -turkishness
July 31 2007
A scholar at the University of Minnesota’s Center for Holocaust &
Genocide Studies has filed a case with the European Court of Human
Rights that he says is the first attempt to overturn through that
legal channel a controversial provision of Turkey’s penal code that
criminalizes "denigrating Turkishness."
Taner Akcam, a Turkish sociologist and historian, has faced retribution
in his home country for his academic work about the killing of as
many as 1.5 million Armenians during the waning days of the Ottoman
Empire, which modern Turkish governments have refused to characterize
as genocide. Mr. Akcam has been outspoken in his willingness to do
so, in for example his most recent book, A Shameful Act, which was
published last year, and he has come under attack as a result.
He was charged under Article 301 of Turkey’s penal code, which has
been used frequently against journalists, academics, and writers,
and which Amnesty International says "poses a direct threat to the
fundamental right to freedom of expression."
Hrant Dink, a journalist of Armenian origin who was also charged
under Article 301, was killed earlier this year. Elif Shafak, an
assistant professor of Turkish and women’s studies at the University
of Arizona, was acquitted last year of Article 301 charges stemming
from her latest novel.
Mr. Akcam was charged with Article 301 violations when he wrote
an article in support of Mr. Dink, a friend, before his death, and
he says that he has also received many death threats and has been
subjected to online harassment, for example through false entries in
his online Wikipedia biography.