New Wave of Arrests For Journalists?

For the past year, around 40 media workers have been released from prison in Turkey after the limitation of cautionary arrests terms to 5 years. However, it seems likely that the governments s preparing on a new wave of arrests for critical journalists who reported on the December 17 Corruption Probe. 

According to BIA Media Monitoring Reports, the number of jailed journalists fell from 104 in 2010 to 59 last year and to 19 by November 2014. 

But these releases are far away from relieving journalists as several others are being ordered to stand trial for their works. 

Corruption Probe reporters 

Lately, several journalists including Mehmet Arif Koşar and Vural Nasuhbeyoğlu from Daily Evrensel; Reyhan Çapan from Özgür Gündem; Barış İnce from BirGün; Musa Kart, Canan Coşkun, İbrahim Yıldız and Aykut Küçükkaya from Cumhuriyet; and Harun Çümen from Zaman. 

Most of the charges were related to insult (Turkish Penal Code Article 125) and violating the confidentiality of an investigation (Turkish Penal Code Article 285) regarding the December 17 Corruption Probe. 

The government’s attitude to portray reporting on the issue as “conspiracy” and influencing of the court system are worrying journalists that a new wave of arrests could impact critical journalism. 

Özkaya faces 9 years of prison 

For instance, Taraf newspaper reporter is facing 9 years of prison for reporting on Halkbank’s former GM  Süleyman Aslan whose shoeboxes contained 4.5M dollars. 

While Aslan’s charges on corruption has been dropped, Özkaya is still standing trial for “violating the confidentiality of an investigation” and “attempting to influence a fair trial”. 

Özkaya’s 10 articles on the issue were cited in the case indictment. (EÖ/HK/BM)

* Click here to read the article in Turkish.