Prominent journalist Aydın Engin passes away at 81

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Aydın Engin, a journalist for over half a century who left his mark on Turkey's press history, has lost his life at the age of 81.

Engin underwent a surgery on Tuesday (March 22) because of a gallbladder problem and a second operation yesterday due to a leak observed after the first one. After complications caused by the operations, he was taken to the intensive care unit.

On February 11, Engin announced that he would take a break from writing column articles for the T24 news portal.

During his career spanning 53 years, Aydın worked for and managed several newspapers and online news portals, such as Yeni Ortam, İlke, Politika, Cumhuriyet, Birgün, Agos, and T24.

Since the 1970s, he has been arrested seven times in political cases. He lived in Germany in exile for 12 years because of the cases filed against him.

When he was detained in an investigation into Cumhuriyet newspaper in November 2016, he said, "I'm a senior defendant of the press. I've never seen such an immoral file in my life. I'm not saying nonsensical, I'm saying immoral."

He was born in 1941 in Ödemiş, İzmir. While he was studying law at İstanbul University, he dropped out to be a stage actor and a playwright. He played in and wrote several plays.

Engin started journalism in 1969. He was arrested after the 1971 military memorandum. He later joined the Socialist Workers' Party of Turkey, the first party founded after the coup. He married Oya Baydar, a founder of the party.

In the 1970s, he established the İlke magazine and managed the Politika newspaper. Several lawsuits were filed against him because of his articles.

Upon his release from prison in June 1980, he moved to Germany, where he lived in exile for 12 years. He received heavy prison sentences in his absence after the 1980 military coup.

He returned to Turkey in late 1991 after a limited amnesty. He worked as a reporter and a columnist for Cumhuriyet between 1992 and 2002.

He was among the founding members of daily BirGün. He wrote column articles for Agos, a bilingual weekly newspaper in Armenian and Turkish.

He was detained in November 2016 for "committing a crime in the name of the "Fetullahist Terrorist Organization (FETÖ)" and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) while not being a member of them." He was later released with an international travel ban. (HAS/VK)