‘5 journalists assaulted in Turkey in the first 15 days of 2021’

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Main opposiiton Republican People's Party (CHP) Eskişehir MP and Human Rights Working Group member Utku Çakırözer has made a statement after Orhan Uğuroğlu, the Ankara Representative of Yeniçağ Newspaper, was physically attacked on Friday (January 15).

CLICK - 2 journalists, 1 politician attacked within 24 hours

Utku Çakırözer, also a former journalist himself, has raised concerns that five journalists were assaulted in the first 15 days of 2021.

CLICK - BIA Media Monitoring Reports

According to the numbers shared by Çakırözer, 34 journalists were assaulted in Turkey in 2019 while this number was 17 in 2020.

"We have been warning for two years. The threats targeting journalists are turning into assaults," Çakırözer has noted.

Referring to the attack on Future Party Vice Chair Selçuk Özdağ on the same day, Çakırözer has underlined that it is the "main responsibility of the government to ensure that journalists can use their press freedom, just as the assaulted Future Party Vice Chair Selçuk Özdağ and all other politicians can use their freedom of expression in full."

The MP has stressed that in order to ensure that journalists and politicians can fully benefit from these rights, their right to life must be protected as the first priority: "If the perpetrators of these assaults are not given deterrent punishments, the attacks will keep on increasing incrementally."

Attacks on the increase

Referring back to the previous years, CHP's Utku Çakırözer has indicated, "In 2019, journalists Sabahattin Önkibar, Ahmet Takan, Yavuz Selim Demirağ and Murat İde were assaulted in the middle of the street due to their articles and news", raising concerns that "the ones responsible for these attacks were not given deterrent sentences."

"This policy of impunity paved the way for new assaults," Çakırözer has said and added, "The assaults continued in 2020 as well. 17 press members, including local journalists from Elazığ and Diyarbakır provinces, were battered or threatened due to their news and posts."

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'Grave course of events'

"This year has also begun with assaults on journalists. Anadolu'nun Sesi [Voice of Anatolia] News Coordinator İzzet Tınmaz in Aksaray; journalists Murat Uçkaç and Kıymet Sarıyıldız, covering news in front of the Courthouse in Aydın; KRT TV presenter lawyer Afşin Hatipoğlu in İstanbul and Yeniçağ Newspaper's Ankara Representative Orhan Uğuroğlu were assaulted in the middle of the street. We need to stop this grave course of events."

Against this backdrop, Çakırözer has underlined that "in order to stop these attacks targeting journalists and politicians, the government must first stop threatening and targeting journalists over their news and articles and politicians over their dissenting opinions."

'If no press freedom, no democracy'

Concluding his remarks, Çakırözer has said, "In a country where there is no press freedom or freedom of expression, one cannot talk about democracy or reform. The policy of impunity so far in effect for the ones who assaulted journalists and politicians must end, the perpetrators of these attacks must be brought to account before the court and the necessary deterrent sentences must be given." (DŞ/SD)