Author: Badalian Vardan

SUSPECT GETS LIFE IN DINK MURDER CASE, COURT SEES NO ‘DEEP STATE’ ROLE

Today’s Zaman

Jan 17 2012
Turkey

A Turkish court has handed down life imprisonment for Yasin Hayal,
a major suspect in the killing of Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant
Dink, of instigating a murder while another suspect Erhan Tuncel was
acquitted of murder charges.

The Ä°stanbul 14th High Criminal Court issued its ruling in the
25th hearing of the case, ending a five-year trial. The two, and all
other suspects, were cleared of charges of membership in a terrorist
organization. Tuncel was given 10 years and six months for an unrelated
McDonalds bombing in 2004.

The late editor-in-chief of the Turkish-Armenian weekly Agos, Dink
was shot dead on Jan. 19, 2007 by an ultranationalist teenager outside
the offices of his newspaper in Ä°stanbul in broad daylight. Evidence
discovered since then has led to claims that the murder was linked to
the “deep state,” a term used in reference to a shady group of military
and civilian bureaucrats believed to have links with criminal elements.

Tuncel, one of the key suspects in the murder who was previously a
police informant, had his final defense statement at the hearing.

Tuncel, who was accused of being an instigator of the murder, said
that the murder was an action of Ergenekon, a clandestine organization
whose alleged members are currently standing trial in court cases on
charges of plotting against the government.

In 1999, lawyers in the trial over the murder of Dink had demanded that
the court request documents seized during the Ergenekon probe relating
to the organization’s Cage Action Plan against minorities in Turkey.

The lawyers had stated at the time that Dink’s killing, along with
the 2006 killing of an Italian priest and the 2007 killing of three
Christians in Malatya, was part of an operation in the works being
carried out by Ergenekon. They also said that when Dink was facing
charges under the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) Article 301, which then
criminalized “insulting Turkishness,” some of the people who are in
jail now as alleged Ergenekon members brought crowds of protestors
and even attacked Dink and his supporters as they entered and left
the courtroom.

In September last year, prosecutor Hikmet Usta announced his opinion
as to who masterminded the assassination and as to the accusations
directed at suspects during the 20th hearing of the Dink trial. The
prosecutor said the murder was the work of Ergenekon’s Trabzon cell
and demanded life imprisonment for seven suspects, including key
suspects Hayal and Tuncel, on charges of attempting to destroy the
constitutional order.

Following the announcement of the court ruling, a group of people
supporting Dink’s family and demanding justice for Hrant Dink showed
outrage with the ruling.

Dink family’s lawyer, Fethiye Cetin, slammed the ruling, saying it
meant that a “state tradition of political murders” was deliberately
left intact because it did not deal with accusations of state
involvement in the 2007 murder.

“They made fun of us throughout the five-year trial process. We did not
know they saved the biggest joke to the very end,” she told reporters
soon after the verdict was read out. “This ruling means a tradition
was left untouched. The state tradition of political murders. The
tradition of state discriminating against some of its citizens and
turning them into enemies,” she said.

Cetin also vowed to pursue all available legal remedies against the
ruling, asserting that the verdict marked the end of only an initial
phase of the case, which consisted of the trial of hitmen in the
murder. The prosecutor in the case also plans to appeal the verdict.

In Brussels, Peter Stano, spokesperson for enlargement commissioner
Stefan Fule, said the EU recalls the ECtHR (European Court of Human
Rights) judgement in 2010, which found that Turkey had failed to
conduct effective investigations into the murder of Dink, thus not
guaranteeing his right to life.

In 2010, the European Court of Human Rights ordered Turkish
authorities to pay 100,000 euros to Dink’s family in compensation,
saying authorities had failed to protect Dink even though they knew
ultra-nationalists were plotting to kill him.

He said all involved need to be held accountable before the law and
further judicial investigations into the implication of high ranking
officials need to be conducted. He added that the EU underlines the
importance for Turkey to address the systemic shortcomings in its
justice system as made evident in this ECtHR judgement and urged the
full execution of the ECtHR judgement which he said is crucial for
Turkey in order to fight impunity.

Court grants preliminary injunction against erasing of phone records
The court granted a preliminary injunction against the erasing of
mobile phone records for calls made in the area of the assassination.

According to the ruling, all calls made between the dates of Aug. 19,
2006 and Feb. 19, 2007 will be kept by the Telecommunications
Directorate (TÄ°B) as the prosecutor’s office may ask for these
records at any time.

After the finalization of the case by the Ä°stanbul 14th High
Criminal Court, the Dink case is supposed to go to the Supreme Court
of Appeals, Cetin had told Today’s Zaman, because the court demanded
the prosecution examine the TÄ°B records more thoroughly.

“If there is new evidence, the case could be reopened with an
additional indictment,” Cetin said.

During the 24th hearing of the trial that took place on Jan. 9,
Cetin said the TÄ°B had provided the court with incorrect records of
phone calls made on the day of the murder, Jan. 19, 2007. TÄ°B told
the court that 6,235 phone conversations took place in the vicinity
at the time of the murder and that 9,300 people were carrying cell
phones in the area. It also said that its records showed no link to
any of the cell phones.

However, Cetin said at least five cell phone numbers belonging to
people who were present at the crime scene on the day of the murder
were directly connected to Mustafa Ozturk and Sahil Hacısalihoglu,
two suspects in the investigation.

She went on to claim that one of the numbers assigned to a cell phone
present in the area at the time of the murder had made 19 calls to
suspect Ozturk between the dates Oct. 22, 2005 — about two years
prior to the murder — and Jan. 27, 2007.

This was not the first time the Dink family lawyers have discovered
information that appears to have been secretly held from the
prosecution and the court. Footage from active security cameras at
shops and banks located close to the crime scene was also mysteriously
lost. These recordings would have been invaluable in identifying
those associated with the murderer on the day of the assassination.

The lawyers have been expressing their frustration that there may have
been attempts to protect the suspects. A lengthy list of suspicious
irregularities in the Dink murder investigation, including deleted
records and hidden files, suggestive of a police cover-up attempt,
has marred the judicial process.

Much of the evidence has indicated that the murder could have been
prevented. Since the day of the murder, mounting evidence has indicated
that the police were tipped off about the assassination plot some
months before the actual attack. Ä°stanbul’s police chief has also
acknowledged that there was a tip-off about a possible attack on Dink,
but said its priority level was too low for his department to take
it seriously.

More dishearteningly, links between the police and suspects have been
revealed. For example, Erhan Tuncel, a key suspect in the murder,
was previously a police informant. Although Tuncel is suspected of
having incited Dink’s murderer, he is also said to be the one who
tipped off Ä°stanbul police. Important evidence, including Tuncel’s
police records, was hidden from the court. In fact, Tuncel’s file
with the police was destroyed, since it constitutes a “state secret,”
according to officials.

The investigation has yielded more evidence linking the masterminds
of the murder plot to the police force in Ä°stanbul and Trabzon, the
hometown of most of the suspects and the place where the assassination
was planned, and in Ankara, where the police were in possession of
intelligence about the murder.

In July last year, Ogun Samast, the hitman in the murder of Dink,
was sentenced to nearly 23 years in jail. Samast, tried in juvenile
court because he was a minor at the time of the crime, was sentenced
by the court to 21 years, six months for “premeditated murder” and
one year, four months for carrying an unlicensed gun.

In his final testimony to the court, Samast called for his acquittal
and blamed certain newspapers and columnists, saying what he had read
in those papers had incited him to commit the crime. “How else would
I have known about Hrant Dink or Agos if they had not written about
them,” he told the court.

Hrant’s Friends vow to fight for justice to be served “Hrant’s
Friends,” who hold demonstrations before each trial demanding justice,
met at the BeÅ~_iktaÅ~_ and Dolmabahce Squares on Tuesday before the
hearing of the case started. Carrying a placard that read, “For Hrant,
for Justice,” the group walked to the courthouse.

The group included Dink’s widow, Rakel Dink, main opposition Republican
People’s Party (CHP) Ä°stanbul Chairman Oguz Kaan Salıcı, Voice of
the People Party (HAS Party) Ä°stanbul Chairman Mehmet Bekaroglu, Peace
and Democracy Party İstanbul deputy Sırrı Sureyya Onder and several
artists. They also chanted slogans such as, “This case won’t end like
that,” “Murderer state will be accountable,” “You are my brother,
Hrant against fascism” and “We are all Hrant, we are all Armenians.”

Garo Paylan, who read a statement on behalf of the group said in
regards to the expected ruling:

“The ruling is the state’s decision. The ones who decided to take
Hrant from us five years ago — the security forces, gendarmerie,
intelligence, judiciary, media, government, opposition — will once
again make a decision in the courthouse. They will say that the murder
is the job of two or three hitmen. They will try to hide in their dark
world. But we know them. They don’t know a thing: This case will not
end before we say that it did.”

Paylan also reminded that it will be the fifth year of the Dink’s
murder on Thursday. “We will shout out the words we have been shouting
at them for five years: You are murderers.”

He also reminded that Hrant’s Friends will gather in Taksim Square
on Jan. 19 and walk to the spot where Dink was killed. Similar
demonstrations are planned outside of Turkey as well. “We will be
out on the streets until we find you one by one. For Hrant,” he added.

25 ARMENIAN INMATES TO DECLARE HUNGER STRIKE – NEWSPAPER

NEWS.am
January 17, 2012 | 09:18

YEREVAN. – Around twenty-five inmates, who are serving life sentences
in Armenia’s Nubarashen Prison, will declare a hunger strike on
Tuesday, Hraparak daily writes.

“They have prepared three letters-[addressed] to Armenia’s President,
the Council of Europe, and the Red Cross offices-in which they inform
about their intention, and demand that the President’s representative
visit them and listen to their demand. And they demand a review
of their cases, pursuant to the law, and to make their sentences
correspond with the changes in Armenia’s Criminal Code, that is, they
be sentenced to 15-20 years in prison. In recent months they sent
letters to corresponding agencies, on numerous occasions, but they
were not responded to. And this became the reason for this extreme
measure. They note that if their demand is not met this time as well,
[twenty-five] more will join the first twenty-five hunger strikers in
several days, and this will continue until their voices are heard,”
Hraparak writes.

AI EXPERT: DINK WAS MURDERED FOR PEACEFULLY EXPRESSING HIS OPINIONS

PanARMENIAN.Net
January 17, 2012 – 14:21 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net – The Turkish authorities have failed to address state
officials’ alleged involvement in the killing of journalist and human
rights activist Hrant Dink, Amnesty International said Monday, Jan 16,
as the trial of 18 people accused of his murder drew to a close.

Hrant Dink, a Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, was killed on 19
January 2007 outside the offices of the Agos newspaper where he was
the editor.

When the trial ends on Tuesday, almost five years to the day after the
death of Hrant Dink, the authorities will still not have investigated
the full circumstances behind his murder, AI notes.

“Hrant Dink was murdered for peacefully expressing his opinions,” said
Andrew Gardner Amnesty International’s expert on Turkey. “The security
services knew of the murder plot and were in communication with those
accused of the murder yet nothing was done to stop it taking place.

Nothing short of a full investigation into the actions of all the
state institutions and officials implicated in the murder will
represent justice.”

Calls by the Dink family to investigate the collusion and negligence
of state officials in the murder, backed by a European Court of Human
Rights judgment in 2010, have not been heeded.

In July 2011 Ogun Samast, 17 years old at the time of the murder,
was found guilty of shooting Hrant Dink and was sentenced to nearly
23 years in prison by a Children’s Court. He was initially given a
life sentence but the term was commuted because he was a minor at
the time of the murder.

In June, Colonel Ali Oz and six other Trabzon Gendarmerie officials
were convicted of negligence for their failure to relay information
of the plot that could have prevented the murder.

“The actions of the Trabzon Security Directorate, Istanbul Governor’s
office and the Istanbul Security Directorate have not been effectively
investigated,” said Andrew Gardner. “The authorities must address
this immediately and ensure that Hrant Dink and his family receive
the justice they deserve.”

Hrant Dink was best known for being critical of the Turkish government
over issues of Armenian identity and over official versions of history
in Turkey relating to the massacres of Armenians in 1915. He was
repeatedly targeted for expressing his opinions. In 2005, he was given
a six-month suspended prison sentence for “denigrating Turkishness”
in writings about the identity of Turkish citizens of Armenian origin,
AI reminds.

The court is expected to issue a ruling on Dink case today, Jan 17.

IL “CORTILE” DI ANTONIA ARSLAN

korazym.org

Domenica 15 Gennaio 2012

Scritto da Caterina Maniaci

E’ uscito l’ultimo libro di Antonia Arslan, dal titolo “Il cortile
dei girasoli” (edizioni Piemme) e siamo subito andati a comprarlo. In
attesa del nuovo romanzo della “trilogia” armena”, dopo il grande
successo della “Masseria delle allodole” e della “Strada per Smirne”,
e dopo “Ishtar 2. Cronache dal mio risveglio” (dedicato al doloroso
capitolo di una sua recente malattia) la Arslan pubblica un insieme
di piccoli “quadri” – ricordi, ritratti, appunti, paesaggi – che
compongono il vasto universo dell’autrice. Bisogna ammetterlo: per
chi scrive Antonia Arslan non è semplicemente una importante autrice
contemporanea, una delle pochissime voci autentiche della letteratura
nostrana che sappia usare la lingua italiana come uno strumento usato
per creare bellezza. E’ questo ma molto di più. E’ stata la docente
ammirata, diventata poi modello, negli anni di universita a Padova,
dove ha insegnato a lungo Letteratura italiana moderna e contemporanea,
la quale, con le sue lezioni, ha innescato un amore imperituro per
la poesia e il gusto per piccoli, grandi autori poco conosciuti,
soprattutto donne.

I suoi saggi davvero pioneristici sulla narrativa popolare
dell’Ottocento e sulle scrittrici e poetesse italiane hanno dischiuso
un mondo nascosto e affascinante: chi aveva mai parlato e scritto così
della Marchesa Colombi e del suo microcosmo provinciale… E delle
poesie della padovana, di origini armene, Vittoria Aganoor Pompilj…

Ecco, l’identita armena è la chiave di volta di tutta la straordinaria
educazione culturale operata dalla Arslan. La storia di questo popolo
le era impresso nell’anima, perche era ed è storia di famiglia,
storia di generazione, ma quando cominciò a tradurre le poesie di
Daniel Varujan la forza, la drammaticita, ma anche la profondita
e la bellezza di questa storia diventarono carne e sangue, parole
e racconto. Non solo per lei, ma di riflesso per molti altri. Il
ricordo della prima lettura di quelle poesia è ancora fortissimo e,
in qualche modo, lacerante: lei ci fece leggere – e lesse in pubblico
– quei versi traboccanti di gioia di vivere, di immagini del Paese
lontano e amato – l’Armenia dei campi, dei giardini, delle chiese
di pietra, dell’Ararat – e anche grondanti di sangue, di morte,
di ferocia, scatenati dalla persecuzione contro il popolo armeno. E
così, per noi e molti altri, l’Armenia diventò una patria d’elezione,
dell’anima e scoprimmo le sue tracce tutt’intorno a noi.

Cominciammo a conoscere la Venezia armena, con il grande collegio
ormai disabitato e il giardino silenzioso, e soprattutto l’isola
di San Lazzaro con le sue memorie custodite dai padri mechitaristi,
e dalle finestre del convento si potevano immaginare le acque della
laguna trasformate in quelle, limpide e serene, del lago Sevan, in
cui si specchiano gli antichi profili del monastero di Sevanavank,
corroso dal vento e dalla pioggia. Quando uscì “La masseria delle
allodole”, nel 2004, la commozione fu grande. Veniva rievocata lo
sterminio di un intero popolo attraverso la vicenda terribile di una
famiglia, quella di Antonia, usando una prosa intensa, delicata ma
senza alcuna censura della realta, e fu anche grazie a questo romanzo
che il genocidio perpetrato dalla Turchia diventò meno oscuro e
dimenticato. Frammenti di quella storia, ma insieme di molto altro,
emergono anche dalle pagine del “Cortile dei girasoli parlanti”,
attraverso lo stesso linguaggio limpido, poetico, evocativo.

Ne è esempio il breve brano che ha dato il titolo al libro, ambientato
a Longiano, paese bellissimo nelle colline intorno a Cesena, mentre
avvolge la scrittrice, che si sporge dagli spalti del castello. Guarda
il paesaggio sottostante e vede un cortiel, dentro il quale . La
bellezza è ovunque e cerca sempre una Presenza che, come il sole,
può oscurasi, ma non scompare mai.

OSCE TO MONITORING CONTACT LINE BETWEEN ARMENIAN, AZERBAIJANI ARMIES

Trend
Jan 16 2012
Azerbaijan

Monitoring will be held on the contact line between Armenian and
Azerbaijani armed forces in the north-west of Kurapatkino village in
the Khojavand region on Jan.17, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said.

The monitoring will be held under a mandate of the OSCE chairman.

The monitoring will be held on the Azerbaijani side by the OSCE
Chairman-in-Office Personal Representative Andrzej Kasprzyk’s field
assistants Imre Palatinus, Christo Christov and William Pryor.

The monitoring will be held on the opposite side, which the
international community recognizes as Azerbaijani territory, by
OSCE Chairman-in-Office Personal Representative Andrzej Kasprzyk,
his field assistants Antal Herdich and Marius Puodziunas.

The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988
when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. Armenian
armed forces have occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan since 1992,
including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and 7 surrounding districts.

Azerbaijan and Armenia signed a ceasefire agreement in 1994. The
co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group – Russia, France, and the U.S. –
are currently holding the peace negotiations.

Armenia has not yet implemented the U.N. Security Council’s four
resolutions on the liberation of the Nagorno-Karabakh and the
surrounding regions.

OFFICIAL SLAMS COURT RULING OVER ARMENIAN PROPERTY

Hurriyet Daily News

Jan 16 2012
Turkey

Located in Eminönu district, Sansaryan Han was refashioned into
the Police Headquarters in 1944 and gained notoriety as a bastion of
ill-treatment by the police. DAILY NEWS photo, Emrah GUREL The head
of Turkey’s Foundations Directorate General has sharply criticized
a recent ruling by an Istanbul court to impose an interim injunction
over Sansaryan Han, a historical Armenian shopping center, following
an appeal by the Turkish-Armenian Patriarchate.

“To tell the truth, it seems quite significant to me that the
Patriarchate has demanded for an interim injunction to be imposed
over the sale of Sansaryan Han. [The Patriarchate] must be aware
of the fact that we are not going to put it up for sale. I imagine
[they] have engaged in a symbolic struggle, a legal battle,” Adnan
Ertem, the head of the Foundations General Directorate, said Friday,
adding they were going to object to the ruling next week.

Located in Istanbul’s Eminönu district, Sansaryan Han was refashioned
into the Istanbul Police Headquarters in 1944 and eventually gained
notoriety as a bastion of ill-treatment by the police, as many people,
including a number of prominent poets and writers, had been tortured
there. “The Sansaryan Mıgırdic Aga Foundation was established by
an Armenian subject of the Ottoman [Empire]. It is a foundation that
ZZZZhas nothing to do with [minority] community foundations. As such,
it is out of question for this foundation to take advantage of laws
applicable to community foundations and for Sansaryan Han to be handed
over to the Armenian Patriarchate,” Ertem said.

The court ruling pertains only to the sale of the property in question
and does not prevent Sansaryan Han to be put up for rent or opened
to investment through the build-operate-transfer model, he said.

Ertem also said they had endeavored massively to rectify the injustices
that befell upon minority community foundations after 1936, the
date of an official decree that required foundations to submit a
proclamation detailing their assets, which eventually led to the
properties’ confiscation.

Sansaryan Han ought to be given a foundation status within the
framework of the Lausanne Treaty of 1923 to gain legal recognition
as a minority foundation, he said.

Sansaryan Han was registered on the Foundations Directorate General
in 1936, the same year when minority community foundations gained
legal status, he added.

“The Patriarchate, in that case, could have appealed on that day
to claim that the Sansaryan Mıgırdic Aga Foundation was theirs,”
he said, adding that an incident that took place 74 years ago would
have no legal repercussions today.

EUROVISION VOTING RULES CHANGED

PanARMENIAN.Net
January 16, 2012 – 21:46 AMT

PanARMENIAN.Net – A new decision was passed regarding the Eurovision
2012 Song Contest to be hosted by Azerbaijan in May.

The voting will be held in last 15 minutes. It was decided in 2010
that the voting lines should be opened from the very start of the show
in order to give viewers the opportunity to vote throughout the show.

This year the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) decided to restore
the old voting system.

The decision came to force. Jury will give points to the participants
due to the results of main rehearsals at the Eurovision 2012 Song
Contest in Baku as it was in previous years, APA reported.

STATE AGENCY: ARMENIAN CONSUMERS CAN COMPLAIN ABOUT SHOPS WHICH REFUSE TO TAKE SOLD GOODS BACK

/ARKA/
January 16, 2012
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, January 16. /ARKA/. Armenian economy ministry’s agency for
protecting the market and consumers’ rights calls on consumers to
inform it about cases of refusal by shops to take back sold goods,
Levon Khalikyan, head of the agency, said Monday at a news conference.

“Under the Armenian law, shops ought to take back anything returned
no later than in seven days after the purchase, if it is not damaged,
or replace it with another product,” he said. “Signboards in various
shops stating that sold goods are not subject to return contradict
the law. Therefore, we urge people to let us know of such cases.”

The agency’s hot line number: 010 23 56 00.

NKR MFA INFORMATION DEPARTMENT COMMENTS ON SERIAL DECONSTRUCTIVE POSITION OF AZERBAIJAN

ARMENPRESS
JANUARY 16, 2012
YEREVAN

YEREVAN, JANUARY 16, ARMENPRESS: NKR MFA Information Department has
circulated a commentary on approval of the Unified Budget of the
organization for 2012 by the OSCE Permanent Council. Along with
this, the Permanent Council discussed a request to increase the
funding for the Office of the Personal Representative of the OSCE
Chairman-in-Office (CiO) to ensure sufficient resources to investigate
potential incidents on the Line of Contact between the armed forces
of Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijan, in pursuance of the agreements
of February 6, 1995 signed by the three parties to the conflict
(Nagorno Karabakh, Armenia, and Azerbaijan) through the mediation
of the Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Conference, press service of NKR
Foreign Affairs Ministry told Armenpress.

“The idea of increasing the funds for the Office of the CiO Personal
Representative was widely supported by the OSCE member-states. It is
symbolic that the idea was opposed only by the Azerbaijani delegation,
which explained its position by the fact that it could not approve
additional funding for the Office until a final agreement on the
details of the mechanism of the incidents’ investigation was achieved.

Unfortunately, it is not the first time we face a situation where the
actions of the Azerbaijani leadership fully contradict the earlier
statements and agreements at the highest level, in particular, the
agreements achieved in Sochi on March 5, 2011 by the Presidents of
Russia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.

This confirms once again that Azerbaijan is not interested in
the investigation of incidents on the Contact-Line, since it
will be eventually established that it is the Azerbaijani party
that periodically exercises provocations, thereby deepening the
hostility and distrust of the parties towards each other and driving
the negotiation process to a deadlock,” the commentary of NKR MFA
Information Department runs.

PROSPEROUS ARMENIA DISTRIBUTING SATELLITE DISHES IN GYUMRI, SAYS LOCAL RESIDENT

epress.am
01.16.2012

For a week now the Prosperous Armenia party in Gyumri has been going
door to door distributing satellite dishes to the public, Gyumri
resident Vahagn Khachatryan informed Epress.am earlier today.

Khachatryan charged that party representatives have been entering
people’s homes and saying that they’re distributing the satellite
dishes as New Year’s gifts and they can pick up theirs at the local
party office. According to the Gyumri resident, once they go to the
office, they are told in order to receive their “gift” they must sign
up for a Prosperous Armenia membership.

Epress.am attempted to obtain comments on the matter from Prosperous
Armenia central headquarters’ chief of staff Ruben Manukyan, who
said he does not possess such information and knows nothing about
the distribution of satellite dishes.