No release for Taner Kılıç at second hearing of Büyükada trial

CANAN COŞKUN
 
At the second hearing, Amnesty International Executive Board Director, Taner Kılıç, Attorney-at-Law, who is being detained in Izmir, and rights advocates Nejat Taştan and Şeyhmus Özbekli, who were released at the end of the arrest period, presented their defences. Kılıç, in the defence he made by video link at the hearing held yesterday at Istanbul Serious Crime Court No 35, stated that he thought filing charges over the said meeting amounted to criminalising work in the area of human rights. Kılıç, recalling that pro-regime media outlets had repeated that his sister’s husband at one time worked at Zaman newspaper, asked, “Was I to prevent my sister, who married 27 years ago, from doing so because I would be accused 26 years later?”
 
“I am not a ByLock user”
 
Kılıç, stating it had emerged from the report in the file that he was not a ByLock user, said, “Koray Peksayar established in the report dated 13 July that he detected no sign of ByLock having been installed or installed and removed.” Kılıç, noting that the Anti-Cybercrime Branch Directorate had been unable to complete the examination of the phone in five and a half months, said, “The non-arrival of this report has been cited as grounds for extension of detention since June.”
 
“I closed my account”
 
Kılıç said with reference to the allegation about the Bank Asya account, “When reference is made to the account movements, it will be seen that I withdrew my money in full in January 2014 and did not open a new account,” and he called on a report to be obtained by a person with competence in the banking area. Kılıç, stressing that detention had been turned into a punishment, said, “There are 24 of us being held in an eight-person cell. I am staying in the same cell as common criminals. I consequently seek an end to my unjust treatment.” Subsequently, rights advocate Nejat Taştan, who had been released at the end of the arrest period, submitted his defence. Taştan said, “The indictment that has brought us here as suspects is yet another instance of the duress to which it is wished to subject human rights advocates.”
 
“ByLock was never loaded”
 
After the defences had been completed, judicial IT specialist expert Koray Peksayar was heard. Peksayar, stating that ByLock had not been loaded in any way onto Taner Kılıç’s phone, said, “The existence can be seen of an IP record to the ByLock system on 27 November 2014. From information in the intelligence agency report, it is stated that at that time access from the Middle East to the ByLock system was halted. If a VPN was not used on the phone in question, it would have been impossible make entry to this. There is no concrete data as to whether ByLock was used by means of a VPN.” The court ordered the extension of Kılıç’s detention and adjourned the hearing until 31 January 2018.