"Both Our Release and Arrest are Political Decisions"

Journalists who were recently released from the KCK Media case organized a press conference at Özgür Gündem newspaper. Yüksel Genç read the press statement on behalf of the journalists. “Just like the decision of our arrest, the decision of our release is political,” he said.

“As the arrested journalists of this witch hunt started against the Kurdish Freedom Movement on April 14th, 2009, we are  released after 29 months” said Genç. He expressed that they were kept in prison unjustly for 2 years and they’re happy now because they’re free but they feel sourness because they left their political prisoner friends in prison.

“Anti democratic system doesn’t change”

Genç remarked that there are sick prisoners in prison that must be released immediately.

“The government made ‘cosmetic’ arrangements in law because they wanted to get rid of the criticisms from its own public and the international public opinion according to the pressures on freedom of press right before the Presidential elections.”

“These arrangements didn’t create any changes in the core of anti-democratic law system. These arrangements don’t prevent media employees from getting arrested and receiving sentences, it prevents them to receive lifetime imprisonments.”

“Number of jailed journalists is not a measure”

Genç mentioned that the freedom of press in Turkey cannot be measured with the number of imprisoned journalists and said “Permissive decisions of the government, the judiciary under the supervision of the government and the newspaper bosses affected by government’s economic pressures controlling whether the media employees are going to be free or arrested shows the miserable situation of freedom of press”.

Genç stated that the freedom of press is a part of the ongoing peace process and said “Just like the ‘İmralı process’ doesn’t have any legal basis, media employees’ usage of freedom of expression doesn’t have a legal basis”. Genç added that for this process to become negotiations, the release of Abdullah Öcalan is essential.

* Click here to read the article in Turkish.