DGM Committee Becomes Heavy Penalty Committee

However, Turkey recently amended its laws lifting the DGMs and replacing them with heavy penalty courts.

The same DGM committee heard the hearing on Thursday, but under the name of Heavy Penalty Court.

Lawyer Mustafa Rollas, who is also the Izmir head of the Human Rights Association (IHD) and lawyer Hayat Ozveren, represented the defendants in Thursday's hearing. The defendants, who are being tried, based on the anti-terrorism law, were not present at court.

The new heavy penalty court decided that the previous DGM court recordings were valid and took the case up from where it had been left at the DGM.

Lawyer Rollas told bianet that the defendants' file had been joined together with the file of other defendants standing trial for unrelated charges. He said the court rejected their objection.

"Under the new law, a new authorized court should be set up in 15 days," said Rollas.

"But the Izmir DGM took up the case with the same committee but under the new name of Heavy Penalty Court."

The court postponed the trial to September 30 saying the police records of two defendants should be studied.

The reporters were detained in January 20 for being "runaway defendants," and are accused of "aiding illegal organizations through publications."

The Izmir distributors of the newspaper, Mehmet Yucedag, Medine Tunc and Sadik Surer, and DIHA reporters Fahri Kilinc, Sevinc Tuncelili and Ibrahim Acikyer were released after being questioned by a prosecutor.

In their testimony, the detainees said they were only involved in publishing activities and that they were not related to an illegal organization in any way. They added that their alleged involvement in the illegal organization was not based on any evidence.

Police had detained the reporters and distributors for being "runaway defendants" after searching the office. The search was based on a January 12, 2004 decision by the Izmir DGM prosecutor's office. (EO/EA/YE)