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An objection raised against Özgür Gündem daily Publishing Consultant Board member, novelist and columnist Aslı Erdoğan’s arrest was overruled today (September 5) by İstanbul 5th Criminal Court of Justice.
The objection, which had been submitted as a petition 13 days ago, underlined that Erdoğan’s arrest contradicted international law and treaties.
Aslı Erdoğan was detained following the decision of İstanbul 8th Criminal Court of Justice to close the Özgür Gündem daily. She was interrogated as the publishing consultant board member of the newspaper, and was alleged to have committed the crimes of “being a member of an [illegal] organization”, “propagandizing for an [illegal] organization”, and “incitement of the people,” with her articles used as evidence. Following her interrogation, she was arrested by the Criminal Court of Justice on duty on August 19.
Principle of individual criminal responsibility underlined
In the objection, Attorneys Özcan Kılıç and Sercan Korkmaz had pointed to that the decision to arrest Erdoğan was against the Constitution, the European Convention on Human Rights, the Press Law, the provisions required in the jurisdiction of the Constitutional Court and the European Court of Human Rights, as well as the principles of proportionality, clearness.
The lawyers also underlined that arresting Erdoğan, who, according to the statement of the attorneys, had no legal responsibility, for the content of the newspaper as a whole and its publishing principles, contradicted the principle of individual criminal responsibility.
Court finds arrest proportional
According to Dicle News Agency, the court ruled in response to the objection that the arrest decision was proportional. It argued that releasing Erdoğan on probation would be unfavorable in terms of the reliability of the pre-investigation of the anticipated civil law suit and solving the crime in full.
About Aslı Erdoğan
Born in Istanbul, she graduated from Robert College in 1983 and the Computer Engineering Department of Boğaziçi University in 1988. She worked at CERN as a particle physicist from 1991 to 1993 and received an MSc in physics from Boğaziçi University as a result of her research there. She began research for a PhD in physics in Rio de Janeiro before returning to Turkey to become a full-time writer in 1996. Aslı Erdoğan was detained on 17 August 2016 during the police raid on pro-Kurdish daily, Özgür Gündem for being a member of the Advisory Board of the newspaper.
Her first story The Final Farewell Note won third prize in the 1990 Yunus Nadi Writing Competition. Her first novel, Kabuk Adam (Crust Man), was published in 1994 and was followed by, Mucizevi Mandarin (Miraculous Mandarin) a series of interconnected short stories in 1996. Her short story Wooden Birds received first prize from Deutsche Welle radio in a 1997 competition and her second novel, Kirmizi Pelerinli Kent (The City in Crimson Cloak), received numerous accolades abroad and has been published in English Language translation.
She was the Turkish representative of International PEN's Writers in Prison Committee from 1998 to 2000. She also wrote a column entitled The Others for the Turkish newspaper Radikal, the articles from which were later collected and published as the book Bir Yolculuk Ne Zaman Biter (When a Journey Ends) and featured in the 2004 edition of M.E.E.T.'s journal.
She is widely traveled and has an interest in anthropology and Native American culture.
From December 2011 to May 2012, at the invitation of the Literaturhaus Zurich and the PWG Foundation, Erdoğan was Zurich's "writer in residence". (AS/DG)
