CHRONOLOGY II: HRANT DINK’S MURDER
BÝA
Jan 21 2008
Turkey
On the anniversary of Hrant Dink’s murder, the murder trial is still in
its beginnings, yet the investigation is deeply flawed. This updated
chronology reminds the reader of the complicated connections found
in the course of the investigation.
This chronology is an updated version of a chronology of events which
was written by journalist Mehmet Guc and published on the occasion of
the start of the Hrant Dink murder trial on 2 July 2007. The events
from July 2007 until January 2008 have been taken from a special
Hrant Dink edition of the Express Magazine.
6 February 2004 The Agos newspaper publishes the account of Hripsime
Gazalyan, an Armenian from Gaziantep (south-east Turkey), who says
that Turkey’s first woman pilot Sabiha Gokcen was an Armenian orphan
who was adopted after the events of 1915.
24 February 2004 Editor-in-chief Hrant Dink is called to the Istanbul
Governor’s Office, where it is said that he was threatened by two
people in the presence of the vice-governor.
25 February 2004 One day later, following the complaint of one Mehmet
Soykan to the Sisli Public Prosecutor’s Office, Hrant Dink is accused
of "degrading Turkishness" (Article 301) in another of his articles.
26 February 2004 A group of people who identify themselves as members
of the nationalist "hearth of ideals" (Ulku Ocaklary) congregates in
front of the Agos newspaper Office, shouting threatening slogans and
holding placards, saying things such as "Be careful", "you will be
held accountable" and "your hand will be broken".
2 February 2006 Together with his lawyer, Hrant Dink applies to
the Sisli Public Prosecutor’s Office for an investigation into a
threatening letter he received from one Ahmet Demir, resident in Bursa,
who said "your end has come, first we will kill your son and then you".
19 January 2007 Hrant Dink, journalist and writer, dies after he is
attacked when leaving the office of his newspaper at around 3 pm. He
is shot three times in his head and neck. Three empty bullet shells are
found next to Dink’s body. According to the autopsy report, two bullets
hit Dink’s head from behind. Eye witnesses say that the shooting was
committed by a young managed 18-19, wearing jeans and a white beret.
20 January 2007 It is announced that the murder suspect "O.S." was
arrested at a bus station in Samsun (on the Black Sea) at around 11 pm
that day. Istanbul Governor Muammer Guler states that the operation is
conducted by both police and gendarmerie, and that the murder weapon
and the white beret were found on the suspect’s person.
Later it is also claimed that a Turkish flag was found on O.S.’s
person. That night, O.S. is taken to the Samsun gendarmerie station,
and three hours later, at around 2 am, to the Samsun police station.
Towards morning, the suspect is sent to Istanbul in a special plane.
20 January 2007 It is announced that a plastic bag containing a white
beret, a jeans jacket, a pair of jeans and a T-shirt, all believed
to belong to suspect O.S., has been found in a waiting underground
carriage at the Sisli station of the Taksim-Levent line.
20 January 2007 A spokesman of the Yeni Pelitlispor football club
which O.S. played for for a while, claimed that O.S. was not the type
to carry out a murder but that he might have been manipulated.
20 January 2007 Muhsin Yazicioglu, general president of the Great
Union Party (BBP), states that murder suspect O.S. had no relation
to the party’s youth branch, the Alperen Hearths, and that his party
is being targeted unfairly.
21 January 2007 In his first statement at the gendarmerie station in
Samsun, O.S. has claimed that he went to Istanbul and committed the
murder single-handedly after reading Dink’s articles on the internet,
feeling offended and deciding to kill him. In his first statement
in Istanbul, however, he claims that with nine other young men, he
went into the mountain pastures of Trabzon and did shooting practice,
and that he was chosen because of his weapon skills and ability to
run fast.
21 January 2007 According to several newspapers, including Hurriyet,
the bus ticket that O.S. used for his escape to Trabzon was bought
by an unidentified woman.
21 January 2007 Istanbul Police Chief Celalettin Cerrah announces
that there is no political dimension or organisation behind the murder
and that it was motivated by nationalist feelings.
21 January 2007 Retired General Kenan Evren, the leader of the
12 September 1980 military coup and the 7th President of Turkey,
suggests that there must be an organisation behind the murder: "This
murder is not the act of a child or his friends. There is someone in
Trabzon. A 17-year-old was chosen on purpose".
22 January 2007 Istanbul Vali Muammer Guler states that it is up to the
prosecution (and not the police chief) to decide whether the murder was
organised. He does not add any further comments on the investigation.
22 January 2007 Abdulkadir Aksu, Minister of the Interior, states
in a press release at the Istanbul Police Department: "As a nation,
we are deeply saddened by the murder of journalist Hrant Dink. Our
only consolation is that we have caught a considerable number of
people behind the murder".
23 January 2007 A newspaper account based on police sources claims that
O.S.’s father recognised his son from the television news and informed
the police. Furthermore, O.S. bought his ticket in his own name and
used an intercity bus with the number plate 34 JAZ 53. He was arrested
in Samsun because the military informed the Samsun gendarmerie.
23 January 2007 Journalist Ertugrul Ozkok writes: "After the murder, he
did not throw away the two most important pieces of evidence, the gun
and the white beret. Even the police is amazed. Have you asked yourself
why he did not throw away the evidence? The answer is simple. He
returns to Trabzon. There he will boast to his friends that he killed
Hrant Dink. Most probably, his friends will not believe him and make
fun of him. That is why he takes the evidence, just to convince his
friends. And I am frightened of this state of mind. If it were an
organisation, then the state’s intelligence units, security forces,
would destroy it. But how do you destroy this? A quarter or a city?"
23 January 2007 It is announced that Yasin Hayal has frequently met
with a retired colonel living in Trabzon. Colonel H.M.B. has influence
in a group in Trabzon and it is suggested that he has influenced
Yasin Hayal in planning Dink’s murder.
23 January 2007 The last sentence in O.S.’s 8-page statement to the
prosecution is "I regret killing Hrant Dink". O.S. was questioned
the day before after being examined by psychologists.
23 January 2007 According to Milliyet newspaper, the gendarmerie
command of Pelitli district in Trabzon (where both O.S. and Yasin
Hayal lived) have announce via municipality loudspeakers that nobody
should give information to civilians.
23 January 2007 Erhan Tuncel, an arrested student of the Black Sea
Technical University in Trabzon, who is said to have given orders
to Yasin Hayal (who in turn incited O.S. to the murder), is said to
have taken part in the organisation of BBP leader Muhsin Yazicioglu’s
Trabzon visits. In a photo taken at a press conference in Trabzon,
Yazicioglu and Tuncel are in the same photo. Yazicioglu comments:
"I do not think that he is a member of the BBP, but he might have
frequented the Hearth. Are we establishing a crime from every photo?"
23 January 2007 At a B-League football match, the Football Federation
bans a placard saying "We are all Hrant Dink, we are all Armenian"
[the text used on placards at his funeral to express solidarity]
from being shown.
24 January 2007 After being questioned at the police station and being
taken to Besiktas court in Istanbul, suspect Yasin Hayal shouts at
the journalists:
"Orhan Pamuk had better be careful!" The same day, in their first
confrontation, O.S. asks Hayal: "Why did you make me kill him?" O.S.
claims that "Yasin Hayal said ‘kill’ and I killed him".
24 January 2007 Trabzon Mayor Huseyin Yavuz comments on the murder
by saying: " It was a murder carried out in an amateur manner. There
is no ideological organisation. He was used by a person whose name
we know and organised. He was encouraged".
24 January 2007 Istanbul Public Prosecutor Aykut Cengiz Engin announces
that including O.S. and Yasin Hayal five persons have been arrested.
24 January 2007 The Ankara Bar President’s Office demands a discipline
and punish investigation into the alleged threats to Hrant Dink by
the Istanbul vice-governor and two other persons.
25 January 2007 Mete Cagdas, a columnist of a local newspaper in Sinop
(western Black Sea), brings charges against the organising committee
and participants in Hrant Dink’s funeral procession for saying "We
are all Armenian", claiming that this is contrary to Article 301.
26 January 2007 On the demand of the Istanbul Public Prosecution’s
Office, five suspects in the Hrant Dink murder are not charged with
founding a terrorist organisation. This is to the advantage of the
suspects.
28 January 2007 In a match between Kayserispor and Trabzonspor, and in
another match on the same day, placards reading "We are all Turkish",
"We are all from Trabzon", "We are all Mustafa Kemal" are displayed.
30 January 2007 It is claimed that based on information by "key name"
Erhan Tuncel, the Trabzon police informed the Istanbul police of a
possible murder 11 months ago. Student Tuncel states that he worked
as a police informant and informed the police of the murder plan.
1 February 2007 According to ANKA news agency, an officer from the
Trabzon police said that telephone calls by the Dink murder suspects
were listened to from Augst to October 2006. The police allegedly
applied for a new court decision in October to continue listening,
but that was not granted. Because the suspect Yasin Hayal and his
group lived in a gendarmerie zone, the police did not have sufficient
authority to continue listening in on their calls.
2 February 2007 Pictures of murder suspect O.S. appear in the media.
The pictures were taken after his capture in Samsun, and he is posing
in front of a Turkish flag with an Ataturk quote. It later turns
out that the Province Police Chief Mustafa Ilhan and the gendarmerie
commander on duty, Captain Murat Bayrak, as well as a prosecutor were
present when the photos were taken. Police and gendarmerie officers
also made video recordings together with O.S. at the Samsun police
headquarters. O.S. is obviously treated as a hero. Some others have
taken pictures on digital and other cameras and on their mobile phones.
2 February 2007 The Turkish Left magazine, which had nominated Hrant
Dink in 6th place for the "fascists of the year" in 2006, continues
to publish, although the campaign is subject of a court case. The
same magazine continues to publish articles which show that it is
not disturbed by the murder. In an article by Gokce Firat, entitled
"Turkey Has Lost an Enemy", it says:
"Dink does not become a martyr of the press or of democracy because he
was murdered. When he was alive, he was an enemy of Turks and Turkey
who defended the Armenian theses against this country".
4 February 2007 The "police informant" Erhan Tuncel is said to have
been involved in the bombing of a McDonalds’ branch in Trabzon in
2004. Milliyet newspaper finds out that although it was demanded
that he be brought before court by the police after the bombing,
he was never present at any hearings and virtually ignored. Although
the court wanted Tuncel’s telephone calls to be monitored, there was
no application made later.
4 February 2007 At a football match in Afyonkarahisar (central
Anatolia), fans on the tribunes shout "We are all Ogun" [the name of
the young murder suspect] and wear white berets in his support.
6 February 2007 It becomes clear that Erhan Tuncel, the student police
informant, was among those planning Dink’s assassination. He informed
the police in February 2006 that Yasin Hayal would kill Hrant Dink,
and the Trabzon Police Headquarters informed Police Headquarters in
Ankara and in Istanbul. Around 5 months later, gendarmerie officials
were also informed. According to Milliyet newspaper, Yasin Hayal’s
aunt’s husband Coskun Igci was arrested in Trabzon on 31 January and
questioned at the Istanbul Police Department for Terrorism. Igci said
that he had been working as an informant for the gendarmerie since
2004 and that he had informed the gendarmerie intelligence officers
of Hayal’s murder plan in July 2006.
12 February 2007 Trabzon Public Prosecutor Fatih Genc twice visits
the young assasin O.A., who killed the priest Andrea Santoro in
Trabzon in February 2006. Genc asks O.A. if he was incited to the
murder. O.A. however says that he was not.
15 February 2007 Because both Santoro and Dink murders were not
classified as "terrorism", the Communication Monitoring Regulations
do not allow for the monitoring of the criminal organisation.
22 March 2007 It turns out that the "big brother" Erhan Tuncel, who has
been arrested for inciting the Hrant Dink murder, talked to a police
officer called M.Z. from the Trabzon intelligence department after
the murder. M.Z. asks questions such as: "Has your group committed
the murder? Did it happen like you told me? Did Yasin shoot?"
27 March 2007 The BBP leader in Trabzon Province, Yasar Cihan, is
arrested in the Dink case and says in his statement that in Trabzon
everyone knew that Erhan Tuncel and Yasin Hayal were planning to kill
Dink. He claims to have tried to make them give up the plan but not
to have been able to reach them. The son of Cihan says that he knew
Erhan Tuncel at university and that Yasin Hayal was a neighbourhood
friend. "I became close to them both at the Alperen Hearths. I have
no connection to the Dink murder. I have not seen either of them for
a year. I believe that Erhan Tuncel has been used by others."
27 March 2007 Hrant Dink’s son Arat and brother Orhan Dink, with their
lawyer Arzu Becerik, meet with one of the prosecutors responsible
for the investigation, Fikret Secen. This is the second time they
meet with the prosecution. The family has expressed its worries at
the efficacy of the investigation.
28 March 2007 It emerges that the key person Erhan Tuncel was arrested
in Trabzon, and that he was then read the statements of the other
suspects and then let go. His flatmate Tuncay Uzundal says that Tuncel
told him: "Last night they read me the statements of the people they
had arrested. They asked my opinion and then let me go".
Uzundal also explained some of the relations which Tuncel had with MIT
(National Intelligence Service), the police and the gendarmerie.
Uzundal says that he heard of Yasin Hayal’s arrest on television and
that Tuncel did not come home until late that night.
20 April 2007 After the website of the Pelitlispor football club in
Trabzon had published messages supporting the murders of Hrant Dink
and priest Santoro, support for the murder of three Christians in
Malatya on 18 April 2007 becomes apparent at a Malatyaspor website.
The Pelitlispor internet site also speaks of the killers in Malatya
as the "Malatya knights".
10 May 2007 In the course of the investigation it turns out
that the Presidency of the Police Intelligence Department has
destroyed a 48-page report on Erhan Tuncel. Apparently the Chief
Public Prosecutor’s Office had asked the Presidency of the Police
Intelligence Department (PID) for information and documents in a letter
on 29 January. A file sent by PID president and former Trabzon Police
Chief Ramazan Akyurek on 6 February contains the report.
However, it is specified in the accompanying letter that the report
contains vital information that must on no account be transcribed,
and that all the attached files must be destroyed after having been
read. In the same letter it is noted that the relevant file is also
found in the archives and can always be obtained again. Thus the
prosecution destroys the report.
Police officer M.Z., who was the contact person for Erhan Tuncel,
says that Tuncel had told them that Yasin Hayal wanted to kill Hrant
Dink. "We took it seriously and began to look around. We monitored
Yasin’s telephone. When we realised it was serious, we twice sent
a report to the Presidency of the PID, and I used Tuncel to try and
get Hayal to give up the plan."
19 May 2007 Armenian schools in Istanbul are sent unsigned threatening
letters which read "Last warning and alert". According to newspaper
reports, the letters also say "Some Armenians are involved in
activities which damage the unity of Turkey". The letters were sent
to the Esayan, Getronagan and Tibrevank high schools, and Yesilkoy,
Topkapi Levon Vartuhyan, Bakirkoy Dadyan, Tarkmancats and Karagozyan
primary schools.
1 June 2007 Four auditors researching whether there was neglect on
behalf of the Trabzon Province Gendarmerie Command in preventing
the murder of Hrant Dink cannot come to a unanimous decision. Two
auditors demand permission to question four privates employed in the
gendarmerie intelligence, while the two others do not see the need.
12 June 2007 The Reporters Without Borders (RSF) organisation
declare that Veli Kucuk , retired brigadier general who is said to
have threatened Hrant Dink, has relations to the Death Brigades. The
organisation stresses that although the Dink family has demanded his
investigation, Kucuk has not been asked to give a statement.
2 July 2007 Because murder suspect O.S. is under age, the first heairng
of the Dink murder trial is closed to the press. Suspect Erhan Tuncel
claims that he has said everything he knows and that he did his duty
(as a police informant). Suspect Yasin Hayal says that Erhan Tuncel
was the leader. Hrant Dink’s widow said, "I am not accusing them,
but of those whe remain in the dark, who are in darkness." Birgun
and Agos newspapers are accepted as joint plaintiffs.
13 September 2007 After the Trabzon Governor’s Office refuses
permission to investigate some police officers, Dink family lawyer
Bahri Belen requests access to the relevant file in order to examine
it and take photocopies. The Governor’s Office refuses access, saying
that the information is secret.
17 September 2007 The Istanbul Chief Public Prosecution starts an
investigation into singer Ismail Turut and composer Ozan Arif for a
song entitled "Don’t make plans", which indirectly praises the murder
suspects. The Human Rights Association (IHD) and the Association
for Human Rights and Solidarity with the Oppressed (Mazlum-Der)
filed criminal complaints against Turut and Ozan Arif.
28 September 2007 New evidence in the Hrant Dink case emerges. A
recording of a telephone conversation between police informant Tuncel
and police officer M.Z. shows that the police officer knew about the
planned murder before. When Tuncel asks "Did he die?", M.Z. says,
"Of course, the only difference is that [the murderer] was not going
to run away, but he did."
1 October 2007 The second hearing of the murder trial takes place.
Suspected triggerman O.S. says that he was led by Yasin Hayal and
that he took drugs before committing the murder. The prison van which
brought O.S. to court had a sticker with the nationalist slogan "Love
[the country] or leave it" on it.
11 October 2007 The US House of Representatives Foreign Affairs
Committee passes the Armenian Genocide Resolution. Hrant Dink’s lawyer
and his son Arat Dink are accused of "denigrading Turkishness" and
a year imprisonment each is demanded.
6 November 2007 The court decides to drop proceedings against Veli
Kucuk and nationalist lawyer Kemal Kerincsiz.
20 December 2007 The Armenian Parliament discusses Armenian-Turkish
relations. Minister of Foreign Affairs Ali Babacan, historian Yusuf
Halacoglu, writer Orhan Pamuk and academic Baskin Oran are among
those invited, but nobody follows the invitation.
15 January 2008 A recording of a phone call to the Trabzon gendarmerie
emerges, in which an anonymous informant tells the gendarmerie officer
that O.S. went to Ýstanbul with his friends. The information given in
the phone call was not followed up, and the person making the phone
call was not found.
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