The new Turkey |
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05-May-2019 |
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24 October 2018: Prison Sentences of Journalists Aksoy, Taş Upheld
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8 March 2018:| Parliament speaker defends journalist's accreditation ban |
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........The week-long judicial marathon began on 4 December with the resumption of the trial of 29 journalists charged with acting as the “media wing” of the Gülen Movement, which is accused by the government of being behind the July 2016 coup attempt.
Two of these journalists, Murat Aksoy and Atilla Taş, were released at the previous hearing but 20 of them, including Abdullah Kılıç, Habip Güler and Yakup Çetin, are still detained and the 4 December hearing ending with the decision to keep them in detention until the next one, scheduled for 6 February. They are facing a possible sentence of between ten years in prison and life without any parole.
18 August 2017:
Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of August 13, 2017
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The court's new judges yesterday set the next trial date for October 24, Evrensel reported. All the defendants---Gökçe Fırat Çulhaoğlu, Yakup Çetin, Bünyamin Köseli, Cihan Acar, Abdullah Kılıç, Oğuz Usluer, Atilla Taş, Hüseyin Aydın, Murat Aksoy, Mustafa Erkan Acar, Seyit Kılıç, Yetkin Yıldız, and Ali Akkuş---pleaded not guilty. Akkuş is on pretrial probation. The others are jailed, pending the conclusion of their trial. All but Çulhaoğlu, a far-right, ultranationalist politician, are journalists. ................
1 April 2017
Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of April 2, 2017
Journalists rearrested after courts order release
Police on April 1 immediately arrested journalists jailed in Istanbul and the Mediterranean city of Antalya in the wake of the failed July 2016 military coup as they were released from prison, according to the daily newspaper Cumhuriyet. Prosecutors had asked Istanbul's 25th Court for Serious Crimes to release journalists Ahmet Memiş, Bayram Kaya, Cemal Azmi Kalyoncu, Cuma Ulus, Habib Güler, Halil İbrahim Balta, Hanım Büşra Erdal, and Muhammed Said Kuloğlu pending the conclusion of their trial, according to media reports. The court agreed, but prosecutors then appealed that order to the 26th Court for Serious Crimes, which quickly reversed the lower court's order for their release, and Istanbul counterterrorism police arrested them as soon as they were formally released from Istanbul's Silivri Prison, according to the press freedom advocacy group Ben Gazeteciyim ("I am a journalist").
Police in Istanbul also immediately rearrested journalists Yakup Çetin, Bünyamin Köseli, Oğuz Usluer, Ali Akkuş, Atilla Taş, Cihan Acar, Abdullah Kılıç, Hüseyin Aydın, Murat Aksoy, Mustafa Erkan Acar, Seyid Kılıç, and Yetkin Yıldız after their release on April 1, but on new charges of "attempting to overthrow the constitutional order" and "attempting to overthrow the government of the Republic of Turkey or preventing it from doing its duty." Their trial on terrorism charges will continue, and they are currently detained for seven days of questioning on the new charges.
31 March 2017 (?)
Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of March 26, 2017
Istanbul court orders release, pending trial, of at least 19 journalists
Istanbul's 25th Court for Serious Crimes today ordered the release, pending trial, of at least 19 journalists imprisoned in direct relation for their work following the July 2016 failed military coup, according to news reports. The court did not drop any charges against the journalists, who had been imprisoned awaiting trial for roughly eight months. They will now be required to check in with local police and are still banned from foreign travel. The journalists released by Istanbul's 25th Court for Serious Crimes today, and their outlets, are:
Abdullah Kılıç (Meydan)......................
26 January 2017:
Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of January 22
....................Prosecutors accuse 19 journalists of terrorism
Prosecutors in Istanbul are charging 29 people--including at least 19 journalists CPJ listed as imprisoned in its last global census of jailed journalists--with terrorism on suspicion they are linked to an international religious network led by preacher Fethullah Gülen, whom the government accuses of leading a terrorist organization and parallel state structure that it says was behind July 2016's failed military coup. CPJ has reviewed the indictment, which has yet to be submitted to a court.
The jailed journalists include Abdullah Kılıç, Ahmet Memiş, Ali Akkuş, Atilla Taş, Bayram Kaya, Bünyamin Köseli, Cemal Azmi Kalyoncu, Cihan Acar, Cuma Ulus, Emre Soncan, Habip Güler, Halil İbrahim Balta, Hanım Büşra Erdal, Hüseyin Aydın, Murat Aksoy, Mustafa Erkan Acar, Mutlu Çölgeçen, Ufuk Şanlı and Yakup Çetin......................
2 August 2016:
Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of July 31
Judges indict at least 23 journalists on terrorism charges
Judges indicted at least 23 journalists on charges of "being a member of a [terrorist] organization" over the weekend, according to press reports:
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Abdullah Kılıç, formerly with Habertürk TV, and the recently closed daily newspaper Meydan..................
28 July 2016
Turkey Crackdown Chronicle: Week of July 24
At least 48 journalists detained in one week
Police in Turkey detained at least 48 journalists in the past week, according to the independent news website P24 and the Twitter account of Ben Gazeteciyim, a volunteer association of Turkish journalists formed to show solidarity with their threatened colleagues. At the time of publication, 21 of those detained were at Istanbul's Çağlayan Courthouse being interrogated by prosecutors and waiting to see a judge. Eren Şener, lawyer for journalists Bülent Mumay and Arda Akın, told the news website Bianet that prosecutors had asked his clients about their activity on Twitter, news stories they had written, and whether they viewed the Hizmet movement, which the Turkish government accuses of orchestrating a failed military coup on July 15 that left more than 200 people dead, as a terrorist organization.
According to P24 and Ben Gazeteciyim, the 21 people at Çağlayan Courthouse at the time of publication were:
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Abdullah Kılıç .......
25 July 2016:
Police in Istanbul detained Abdullah Kılıç, a former columnist for the shuttered daily newspaper Meydan, on July 25, 2016, as part of a purge of suspected followers of exiled preacher Fethullah Gülen. The Turkish government accuses Gülen of maintaining a terrorist organization and "parallel state structure" (FETÖ/PDY, as the government calls it) within Turkey and alleges that it masterminded a failed July 2016 military coup. Istanbul's First Court of Penal Peace ordered the journalist jailed pending trial on terrorism charges.
According to records of the columnist's interrogation and the order jailing him, which CPJ reviewed, prosecutors interrogated Kılıç on the suspicion that he was a member of FETÖ/PDY's "media arm," based on his work for Zaman and other newspapers the government accuses of manipulating the public to support the organization and the attempted coup. The government took over Zaman and affiliated publications in March 2016 and shut them down by decree in July that year, alleging links to the Gülenist network.
Prosecutors questioned Kılıç on suspicion of "committing crimes in the name of a [terrorist] organization without being a member," "knowingly and willingly helping a [terrorist] organization without being involved in the organization's hierarchical structure," "founding or leading an armed terrorist organization," and "being member of an armed terrorist organization," according to the documents.
Kılıç denied the charges, court documents show. He said that although he worked at Zaman until February 2011, he subsequently worked at other newspapers and television stations and had reported critically on the Gülenist network. Kılıç also said he had criticized previous attempted coups in documentaries, columns, and on social media.
Kılıç said he left Meydan in April 2015, after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in a speech warned, "For the last time: those who stay within this [Gülenist] structure will pay the price and suffer consequences," and that he had worked in the flower business since. Meydanand more than 100 other media outlets were closed by decree along with Zaman on July 27.
In its order to jail Kılıç pending trial, the court noted an apparent discrepancy in the charges against the former columnist: Prosecutors accused him of both being a member of a banned organization and of aiding a banned organization without being a member. The order does not make clear on which of the two charges Kılıç was jailed pending trial.
Kılıç is on trial with several other journalists. When the trial began in March 2017, an Istanbul court ordered Kılıç and several of the other journalists to be released while the case was heard. However, authorities brought fresh charges and the journalists were ordered to remain in custody, according to news reports. Authorities ordered an investigation into the judges who had ordered the release and they were relieved of duty, according to reports.
In the original indictment, all but one co-accused were charged with “being a member of an armed [terrorist] organization,” which carries up to 10 years in prison. The second indictment listed the charges as “attempting, through violence and force, to disrupt and replace the order as recognized by Turkey’s Constitution” and “attempting through violence and force to eliminate or prevent Parliament from carrying out its duties.” Both charges carry a maximum life sentence without parole.
CPJ found both indictments to be similar to those presented at trials of other journalists in Turkey. Prosecutors cited as evidence in these cases journalistic activity or acts of free speech and communication, or cited circumstantial evidence such as being employed by a certain media outlet or having an account at a bank allegedly linked to Gülenists.
The first indictment accused the defendants of manipulating the public perception of FETÖ to turn citizens against the government, which prosecutors argued, made the journalists members of the group that Turkey alleges is behind the attempted coup. The second indictment, which was presented as an addition to the original case, argued that the journalists should be held responsible for more than alleged membership to the group.
In Kılıç’s case, prosecutors cited as evidence in the first indictment his columns at Meydanand his tweets. Witness testimony from former colleagues alleged that Kılıç was pro-Gülen, and the prosecutors alleged that he had an account at Bank Asya, which the government alleged was a Gülenist institution.
The second indictment included as evidence Kılıç's mobile phone activity and communication records with people who were wanted or on trial for alleged Gülenist activity. Some of these people had the Bylock App on their phones, according to authorities, who claim that the app is evidence of being a FETÖ member. Kılıç did not have the app installed on his phone, according to the indictment.
Kılıç was being held in Silivri Prison, Istanbul.*
26 May 2015
Parliament speaker defends journalist's accreditation ban
Kilic is the first journalist who has been given an accreditation ban in Parliament for having asked a politician a question. His lawyer, ?aglayan Erginay, said in a statement to Today's Zaman that the document Parliament has sent to the court does not provide any reasonable explanation for the ban against Kili?. He added that it is shocking that Parliament has called for the continuation of a ban that is not in line with parliamentary regulations without even investigating the complaint against his client.
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