Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

REVUE DE PRESSE-PRESS REVIEW-BERHEVOKA ÇAPÊ-RIVISTA STAMPA-DENTRO DE LA PRENSA-BASIN ÖZET;
Turkish Probe June 2,1995
17
Human Bights Diary
Prosecutor wants high court review of law- A
Turkish prosecutor said on May 25 that part of a law limiting
freedom of expression that Ankara's Western allies want
lifted was unconstitutional and he wanted the high court to
review it. "I believe that a part is against the Constitution and international
conventions," Aytaç Tolay, a prosecutor in the Istanbul State
Security Court said. Tolay said he raised his reservations about Article
8 of the Anti-Terrorism Law, which bans "separatist propaganda," when he
charged 99 people this week for publishing a book of articles by writers
imprisoned for the same crime or promoting racism. Despite his reservations,
Tolay said he had no choice but to charge the intellectuals as long as the law
remained on the books. Because prosecutors are not empowered to refer cases to
the high court, Tolay's move leaves it up to the judges to decide whether or not to send
the case to the Constitutional Court for a ruling. Legal experts say this appeared to be the
first time a prosecutor had requested that Article 8 be forwarded for review. Tolay's criticism
centers on the part of Article 8 banning alleged separatist propaganda "regardless of the
method, intention and ideas behind it." Removing this clause would force prosecutors to show the
defendant intended to damage the "indivisible unity of the state," something those charged generally
have denied. Some Western diplomats praised the move - which theoretically would sharply narrow
the law's application - saying it was one way for critics of the law to get around Parliament's inability to
agree on long-promised reforms. Article 8 has been used to jail scores of writers, academics, trade
unionists and others for written or verbal statements deemed "separatist propaganda.".Most of the people
said or wrote something about Turkey's Kurds. Western allies have called on Ankara to ease restrictions on
freedom of expression, and Prime Minister Tansu Çiller has repeatedly promised to make changes.
The approval of Turkey's custom.s union with Europe may hang in the balance because the European
Parliament has threatened to veto the deal unless concrete steps are taken to better the country's human
rights record. But opposition within Çiller's own party has so far hampered reforms, with some
parliamentarians arguing restrictions cannot be lifted as long as Turkey is battling separatist Kurdish
guerrillas. (Newspapers, May 25)
Triai of 740 PTT employees starts In Bursa- The trial of 740 public employees of the Bursa
branch of the Turkish Postal and Telecommunications agency (PTT) who demonstrated for union
rights without permission started in Bursa on May 26. The PTT employees, members of the
Turkish News Workers Union (Haber I~),staged a demonstration demanding the right to strike and
collective bargaining on Nov. 24 and 25,1994. The demonstration was unauthorized and the union
members now face prison sentences ranging from four months to one year, if convicted.
(Turkish Daily News, May 27)
,
Appeal court reduces prison term for policeman- À five-year prison sentence imposed by the Bolvadin
civil court on Hasan Belek, a police deputy chief, after he had been found guilty of torturing suspects has
been reduced on appeal to two years. The reason given by the United Criminal Chambers of the Court of
Appeals was that "he got no personal satisfaction out of the violence, but was proceeding in the interest of
furthering his professional investigation." According to an Anatolia news agency report on April 3D, Belek
was first sentenced to five years imprisonment by the civil court of Bolvadin for "beating two suspected
thieves with a baton, kicking and slapping the~, locking them in the police headquarters' basement
overnight, stripping them of their clothes in the morning to target them with high-pressured water, hitting
them with a hose and wet towels, bathing them in hot water and salt to get rid of the marks
and leaving them under the sun." However, the court of appeals decided otherwise. The "young
and amateur" deputy chief was found to have gone too far due to his "inexperience" and
"eagerness to perform his duties in an investigation." The five-year sentence was thus
found to be "too rigid" and was lowered to the minimum "one year per tortured person"
sentence. (Turkish Daily News, May 31)
Another missing person found dead- Rldvan Karakoç had not been
heard from since March this year and his family reported him missing
several weeks ago. They later discovered that he had been found dead
and as he could not be identified, he had been buried in the
Ikitelli Cemetery for the Unknown. Identification was made
possible by matching his fingerprints. Karakoç
disappeared at the time of the riots in Gaziosmanpa~a.
(Turkish Daily News, June 1)
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