Court blocks access to news report that led to detention of five journalists

Fırat Can Arslan (Photo: Committee to Protect Journalists)

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A judge in Diyarbakır decided to impose an access ban on a news report regarding the reassignment of a married judge and prosecutor who were presiding over the same case.

The news article, published on July 18 by the Mezopotamya Agency (MA), was written by journalist Fırat Can Arslan, who was subsequently arrested on July 25 on charges of "exposing the identity of anti-terrorism officials and marking them as a target for terrorist organizations."

Four other journalists, including bianet's women and LGBTI+ news editor Evrim Kepenek, were detained for retweeting Arslan's tweet containing the same news report and were later released under judicial control on the same charges. All five journalists were detained during house raids.

The judge and prosecutor mentioned in the news report were presiding over a separate case involving 18 Kurdish media workers. In this case, 15 journalists who had been held in pretrial detention for over a year on charges of "membership in a terrorist organization" were released after the first hearing on July 12.

During the hearing, the journalists' lawyers requested the recusal of the court panel due to the marriage relationship, but the request was denied.

Following this trial in Diyarbakır, it came to light that the mentioned judge and prosecutor had been reassigned to Samsun. Arslan reported this information, which was publicly available on the website of the High Council of Judges and Prosecutors (HSK).

Subsequently, the Diyarbakır 1st Penal Judgeship of Peace issued an access ban order on this news article, based on information from a publicly accessible source. (AÖ/VK)