TURKISH MEDIA COMES UNDER LEGAL PRESSURE
By EROL ISRAFIL
Atlanta Journal Constitution
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
http://www.ajc.com/news/nation-world/turkish-media-comes-under-692470.html