MUSLIMS WANT JUSTICE FOR DINK…
Today’s Zaman
Aug 8 2012
Turkey
When Hrant Dink was killed by a 17-year-old boy on Jan. 19, 2007,
we felt utterly miserable for losing our healer, one who was adept
at repairing the ties of many Armenians like me and “others” with
our country. It was Dink who discovered me as an author and backed
me at all times and motivated me with his exemplary attitude. He was
a frank, bold, smart and conscientious man: a man of Anatolia.
He had given up his comfortable and affluent life in order to put an
end to the self-isolation of Armenians. The reason he published Agos
in both Armenian and Turkish was that he wanted to make two peoples,
Armenians and Turks, know each other, remember an age-old fraternity
and come together again. I worked with him at the same paper for 10
years. Those were hard and dangerous days, but not even once did I
feel that his faith in this country had waned. He never produced a
prejudiced sentence.
At 3 p.m. on that black day on Jan. 19, hearing of the loss of such a
loved one, I thought I witnessed what real hell was in this world. But
I wanted to go and see his body and be with him. I can’t lie to you,
at the time I thought, “Were we wrong? Were Hrant, myself and all of
us more optimistic about this country than we should have been?”
The same doubts were creeping into my mind as I looked at the thousands
of people who had gathered in front of Agos that evening. I continued
to ask myself: “We are fighting in vain. How many people are there
in this country who believe in fraternity, equality and peace?
Can we still nurture hopes for a country which fails to protect a
man of peace like Hrant?”
I knew such sorrows might be experienced anywhere, but the struggle
for upholding goodness must continue. Yet the ember had already fallen
in our house.
When I got to Agos on the day of the funeral, my doubts had flown
away. At least 100,000 or perhaps 200,000 people had come to pay their
final respects to Hrant and protest against the murderers: Armenians,
Turks, Kurds, Muslims, leftists, foreigners, people from Armenia,
headscarved women, those who sounded zılgıts (a form of ululating).
Just to experience this moment to the fullest, I walked together with
my family and friends among the crowd from Agos to Yenikapı. Oddly
enough, I felt like an honored citizen for the first time. The deep
state, i.e., Ergenekon — a clandestine organization nested within the
state trying to overthrow or manipulate the democratically elected
government — might have murdered Hrant, but the enthusiasm, rage
and belief in fraternity of the people were greater than everything.
The murder case went badly. Actually, everything was crystal clear.
The state had been involved in the design, committing and covering
up, i.e., all stages of the murder. The state had intertwined with
the deeper structure in terms of negligence and premeditation. It is
exactly for this reason the case did not progress as it should and
ended up being a fiasco.
Turkey is trying to confront its deep state. But this is not as easy as
it may seem. Old habits, the prevalence of pro-Ergenekon people within
the bureaucracy, and the continuation of the old state’s mentality
make things hard for reformists. Indeed, it is for this reason the
government did not throw its weight behind the case. There are people
who seek to protect the old state or to fight with it when it attempts
to attack them and make do when it comes to agreement with them.
As the case was moving towards becoming a fiasco, and after the
European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) found Turkey in violation of
several articles in the European Convention on Human Rights concerning
how it handled the case, President Abdullah Gul told the inspectors
of the State Audit Institution (DDK) to examine the Dink murder. The
DDK came up with a valuable report. This was a historic report which
revealed the state’s practice of “lack of punishment.”
On Aug. 6, Hrant’s Muslim friends met Mr. Gul. The meeting lasted for
an hour. Omer Faruk Gergerlioglu, Hilal Kaplan and Cemal UÅ~_Å~_ak,
too, attended the meeting. They asked for Gul’s continued support
for solving the murder. Gul is really a very valuable statesman. He
has stated that he has been unable to idly take in the Dink murder
and that the state has responsibility for it.
He noted that he can understand the problems of non-Muslim religious
minorities in Turkey as he closely monitored Muslim communities
in other countries when he was foreign minister. He indicated that
according to the DDK’s report, the inevitability of the Dink murder was
clear and that made him sorry. “The reports prepared upon instruction
by the president will not be shelved,” he said, stressing that he
would make the necessary follow-up if the report went unnoticed.
We hope the efforts of Gul and the We Demand Justice Union will
be productive.