Agos Lawyers Demand Judges Withdrawal

Lawyers for the "Agos" newspaper have criticised the court which is trying license holder Serkis Seropyan and editor Arat Dink. They are in court for an interview in which Hrant Dink said he believed an Armenian genocide had taken place and for their campaign against Article 301.

The lawyers are demanding that the judges of the 2nd penal court in Sisli, Istanbul, withdraw from the case.

The case, which continued this morning (18 July) in the absence of the journalists, has been adjourned until 11 October so that the allegations and the case can be examined by the court.

Among those supporting the Agos journalists was Prof. Dr. Baskin Oran, independent candidate of the left in İstanbul.

Objectivity questioned

One of the journalists' lawyers, Fethiye Cetin, particularly addressed prosecutor Mücahit Ercan who has called for prison sentences for Seropyan and Arat Dink for "degrading Turkishness".

Cetin is demanding acquittal for her clients, saying: "The prosecution is acting as if it has personally suffered a crime. If it cannot act in the name of society, but only in the name of one ethnic group, then there is no objectivity. Any judge who feels emotional closeness to one side also needs to withdraw from the case for ethical reasons."

Scientific work rather than courts

Lawyer Ergin Cinmen, also representing Agos, also called for anyone who was not able to act objectively, to withdraw from the case. He also criticised the fact that the concept of "Turkishness" was being applied to the pre-Republican period: "Then you have to apply Article 301 to 4,000 years of Turkishness, in which case you will have a limitless number of court cases. The judiciary should not do the work of history and sociology."

Yücel Sayman, former president of the Istanbul Bar Association, has said that there are different approaches to an Armenian genocide, and that if historical events were tried in court, there would be no room left for scientific work.

Lawyer Erdal Dogan has criticised that fact that the court accepted individuals as third-party plaintiffs in the Hrant Dink cases. He added that the violence experienced by Hrant Dink and his lawyers in front of court buildings, in the corridors of the building and in the hearing room itself, were ignored.

He said: "I also want it to be considered what kinds of organisations are encouraged by decisions taken here [in court]."

To this, the court president Metin Aydin replied, "if we consider the results created outside, then we can never decide in here." (EÖ/EÜ/AG)