Justice right now

Our Editor-in-Chief Murat Sabuncu, Executive Board Chair Akın Atalay, our reporter Ahmet Şık and our accountant Emre İper will appear once more before a judge today in the trial in which our newspaper’s editorial policy is at issue in the prosecution. Sabuncu and Atalay have been in detention for 421 days, Şık for 360 and İper for 263 in connection with the trial.
 
Our columnists and managers will appear today before a judge for the fifth time at Istanbul Serious Crime Court No 27 within the trial in which our news reports and columns serve as evidence. The Cumhuriyet staffers undergoing prosecution and the trial lawyers have rebutted one by one the baseless and irrational accusations that have previously been put forward. However, the court has until now ordered the extension of our colleagues’ detention in “copy and paste” interim rulings, asserting that the evidence had not yet been gathered.
 
Member judge calls for release
 
Member judge of the court bench Halit İçdemir entered a dissenting opinion against the extension of detention at the fourth hearing on 31 October. In view of Atalay, Sabuncu and Şık having fixed addresses and having no opportunity of tampering with the evidence, the time they had spent in detention, most of the witnesses having been heard and the evidence having been gathered, İçdemir came out in favour of their release. The bench also ordered that witness Mehmet Faraç, who had not attended the hearing despite having been summoned as a witness, along with Leyla Tavşanoğlu and Doğan Satmış be brought forcefully to be heard as witnesses. The court also ordered that, if no application is made by the prosecution or defence for a broadening of the investigation, the prosecution’s recommendation on the merits be requested.
 
Juristic IT experts Tuncay Beşikçi and Koray Peksayar made an examination of the phone of Emre İper, who stands charged of being a ByLock user, and made the determination that ByLock had not been loaded onto his phone. However, the bench paid no heed to these reports and ordered that the submission to the file of the report by the court-appointed expert be awaited. Judicial IT expert Beşikçi had previously compiled expert’s reports in trials such as Poyrazköy, Sledgehammer and Oda TV that were later acknowledged to have been conspiracies and these reports underpinned acquittal rulings. Beşikçi, who was heard as a witness at the most recent hearing on 31 October, said that code which routes to the ByLock network had been inserted by the developer into the music program named Freezy on İper’s phone. Beşikçi, also pointing out that the program named “Namaz Vakitler TR” devoted to prayer times also had this hijacking code, said, “Users of these programs instantly become terrorist organisation members. The person who wrote that code had previously studied at FETO schools and took part in the science olympics. He resigned following 17-25 December and fled the country. This person’s supervisor is a well-known FETO fugitive. I have supplied the prosecution with all their names.” Beşikçi, pointing out at the hearing the way to identify real ByLock users, commented, “Let real ByLock users not get excited. All that needs to be done is for it to be determined if there is a Purple Brain record before ByLock. They were all routed in the same way. Real ByLock users can be identified in this manner.”
 
CHP’S ÇAKIRÖZER: Let us rid ourselves of this disgrace
 
The CHP’s Eskişehir Member of Parliament Utku Çakırözer, who has his roots in journalism, said with reference to today’s Cumhuriyet newspaper trial, “Turkey must from now on be a country in which thought and the expression of thought are free. We must demand this not just for the time in which we live, not just for ourselves, but for future generations. Protecting and developing freedom of thought and expression is our duty and responsibility to future generations. Account cannot be and is not being given to the world for keeping these people in jail for months contrary to freedom of thought and expression. This legal system inspires trust over Turkey in nobody at home or abroad. We must finally rid ourselves of this disgrace. Freedom must be granted at once, not just to the Cumhuriyet staffers, not just to the journalists who are behind bars purely for having thought, written, spoken and criticised, but also to academics, rights advocates and activists.”
 
PRESS PROFESSIONAL ORGANISATIONS
 
The lawlessness must end
 
Press professional organisations, with reference to our paper’s trial set to be held today, united around the view, “In our country 145 journalists are imprisoned. 2018 must be the year in which journalists are no longer held in detention and are freed.” Press professional organisations commented as follows:
 
Turkish Association of Journalists Chair Turgay Olcayto: What is involved is a discredited indictment and four of our colleagues who remain needlessly in jail. I view today’s trial with hope and think our colleagues will be released. Currently 145 journalists are imprisoned in our country. Turkey finally needs to rid itself of the cliché of being the biggest imprisoner of journalists and of this disgrace. In modern countries, there are no writers, cartoonists and journalists in jail for expressing and speaking their thoughts. I think that Turkey should take its place among modern countries.
 
Press Council Chair Pınar Türenç: It is neither acceptable for journalists to be held in detention pending trial, nor can we accept the unjust usurping of 10,000 hours out of the lives of Cumhuriyet newspaper’s managers, columnists and employees for such a long period. I hope that our detained colleagues will be released immediately and I do not imagine that this injustice will last further. 2018 should be the year in which journalists are no longer detained and are made free.
 
Journalists Union of Turkey Chair Gökhan Durmuş: A trial that is to Turkey’s disgrace has been going on for one year. Journalism is on trial and journalists have been deprived of their freedom. This hearing will serve to demonstrate the existence of democracy and law in Turkey. We await the support at Çağlayan of everyone in Turkey who wants democracy, the law and press freedom and respects the right to report the news.
 
Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions’ Press Trade Union affiliate Chair Faruk Eren: The Cumhuriyet investigation collapsed on the very first day. The ensuing indictment was binned by journalists and lawyers. Despite this, four Cumhuriyet staffers have been in detention for over a year. We want an immediate end to this lawlessness. We call on all citizens who want democracy and who want freedom to come out in solidarity with Cumhuriyet.
 
RWB delegation to monitor the hearing
 
The Reporters Without Borders Organisation has announced that it will send an international delegation composed of the organisation’s Turkish representative Erol Önderoğlu along with Chair of the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey and Forensic Medical Expert Prof. Dr. Şebnem Korur Fincancı to monitor the hearing of the Cumhuriyet trial set to continue today and tomorrow.
 
In the organisation’s press statement, Reporters Without Borders General Secretary Christophe Deloire also said that he would be at Çağlayan to monitor the hearing for solidarity purposes. Deloire, calling for the restoration of pluralism and the release of all journalists who have been imprisoned for journalistic activity, said, “The charges against the journalists and freedom of speech activists are absurd and shameful. These charges show that journalism has been criminalised in Turkey.”
 
Verging on the black list
 
It was noted in the statement that, in the 2017 World Press Freedom Index proclaimed in April, Turkey slid down a further four places as against the previous year to fill 155^th place among 180 countries. It is indicated that a mere four places wait before Turkey, which numbers among countries in which conducting journalism is difficult, joins the countries where the situation is gravest, known as the “blacklist”. With it stressed that the conditions, in any case arduous, for journalists in Turkey became critical with the state of emergency proclaimed after last year’s coup attempt in July, it was stated that nearly 150 media outlets were closed, mass hearings were held and Turkey leads the world in terms of the number of detained journalists.