The new Turkey Ersin Çaksu. Journalist in the pro-Kurdish Özgürlükçü Demokrasi newspaper
19-Jan-2020
Case Background:
The buildings of Pro-Kurdish Özgürlükçü Demokrasi newspaper and the printing press Gün Matbaa in Istanbul were raided by police on March 28, 2018. A government trustee was appointed on the same day only until it was shut down by a decree law (No.701) in June.
The newspaper’s publisher İhsan Yaşar was arrested on March 28, following the police raid on the daily’s offices ordered by the chief public prosecutor’s office. It was followed by the arrest of İshak Yasul, the managing editor of Özgürlükçü Demokrasi newspaper on March 30.
On April 4, 2018, seven more editors and reporters of the newspaper were taken into custody in relation to the same case. While three of them were released on bail, editors Mehmet Ali Çelebi, Reyhan Hacıoğlu, Hicran Urun and reporter Pınar Tarlak were put in pretrial detention.
Newspaper staff was brought to court in Çağlayan Courthouse, Istanbul on April 10, after seven days in detention.
Pınar Tarlak was released, pending trial after the hearing on September 12.
At least 20 printing press workers for Gün Matbaa were arrested on the same day of the raid along with the owner of printing press Gün Matbaa, Kazım Zengin. Workers remain in jail since March 28.
Accusations against the newspaper’s executives and journalists include “aiding and abetting a terrorist organization”, “membership of a terrorist organization” and “making terrorist propaganda”. The case file includes as criminal evidence news articles on Turkey’s military operation in Afrin and words used in those articles such as “resistance”, “occupation”, “massacre”, “martyr”, “Kurdistan”, “vicious attack”. Source
The final hearing in the trial of journalists Selman Keleş, Özgür Paksoy, Aziz Oruç, Kenan Kırkaya, İshak Yasul and Ersin Çaksu over a number of news reports published in October 2016 in the now-defunct newspaper Özgürlükçü Demokrasi took place on 28 November 2019 at Istanbul’s 2nd Criminal Court of First Instance.
Issuing its verdict at the end of the hearing, the court sentenced Yasul, Kırkaya, Paksoy and Keleş to five months in prison each on the charge of “publicly degrading the judicial bodies of the state.” The court separated the files of Oruç and Çaksu. The court deferred the sentences of Yasul, Kırkaya and Paksoy while Keleş’s sentence was suspended.
The trial of 22 journalists who were arrested in 2016 during a raid conducted at the offices of the shuttered Özgür Gündem newspaper resumed on 5 November 2019 at the 5th Criminal Court of First Instance of Istanbul. The journalists are charged in the trial with “preventing police officers from performing their duties.”
Defense lawyers Özcan Kılıç, Sercan Korkmaz and Hazal Pekşen Demirhan were in attendance at the courtroom. Ruling to wait for the execution of the arrest warrants issued against defendants Amine Demirkıran, Günay Aksoy, Bayram Balcı and Ersin Çaksu, the court adjourned the trial until 25 February 2020.
6 December 2018:
No new releases in Özgürlükçü Demokrasi trial
The second hearing of the trial into 14 employees of the shuttered daily Özgürlükçü Demokrasi on terrorism-related charges took place on 6 December at the 23rd High Criminal Court of Istanbul.
The pro-Kurdish newspaper’s Istanbul offices were raided by police and the newspaper was appointed a trustee in March before it was closed down in July through an emergency decree. Its publisher, İhsan Yaşar, and responsible managing editor, İshak Yasul, were jailed pending trial on 6 April on terrorism-related charges as part of the investigation. Editors Mehmet Ali Çelebi, Reyhan Hacıoğlu and Hicran Ürün, and bookkeeper and secretary Pınar Tarlak were jailed on 10 April. Tarlak was released at the end of the first hearing of the trial in September.
The defendants are accused of “membership in a terrorist organization,” “conducting propaganda for a terrorist organization” and “printing or publishing terrorist group publications.” News stories featured in the newspaper constitute the grounds for the accusations in the indictment. The other suspects in the indictment are Davut Uçar, Ersin Çaksu, Fırat Benli, Günay Aksoy, Mizgin Fendik, Önder Elaldı, Ramazan Sola and Yılmaz Yıldız.
P24 monitored the second hearing on 6 December, where the defendants made their defense statements. Rejecting the accusations, the jailed journalists requested to be released pending trial.
In its interim ruling at the end of the hearing, the court ordered the continuation of the detention of all jailed defendants in the case. The court also kept the international travel ban imposed on the unjailed defendants in place and ruled to await the execution of the arrest warrants for six other defendants in the case. The next hearing in the trial is set for 21 February 2019. Source
