The accused murderers of Hrant Dink, the slained editor of bilingual Turkish-Armenian biweekly newspaper Agos, will appear before the judge for the fifth time 15 months after the murder. On 28 April hearing (Monday), the remaining questionings are expected to be completed.
The Istanbul 14th Criminal Court, which tries the 19 defendants, eight of whom are arrested, had demanded at the previous hearing that the physical surveillance reports and telephone records concerning the arrested defendants Yasin Hayal and Mustafa Öztürk. It is established now that Yasin Hayal was under the surveillance of the Trabzon Police Department, a major province in the eastern Black Sea region of Turkey, and is accused of inciting the killing, facing strict life imprisonment. Similarly accused Mustafa Öztürk is a member of Alperen Ocakları (translated roughly as Hero-Saint Hearths), a far right nationalistic youth group linked to the Great Unity Party (BBP).
It is not known whether the reports will show a connection between the Trabzon police, Alperen Ocakları and the Great Unity Party (BBP).
However, during the previous trial, the court had removed the obligation that the head of BBP Trabzon provincial organization Yaşar Cihan, the member of the Central Decision and Executive Committee of BBP Halis Egemen and the two other people should join the hearings. Not arrested, these defendants are charged with sentences of up to ten years in jail for “being members of a terrorist organization.”
Lawyer Cinmen: It was planned in Alperen Ocakları, the killers were protected
According to Ergin Cinmen, one of the lawyers of the slained victim, who petitioned the court on February 22, there are indications that the murder was planned at Alperen Ocakları: the statement by Erhan Tuncel, who is being tried as the “inciter brother,” that “I still have the key to Alperenler Ocağı”; his picture with the BBP leader Muhsin Yazıcıoğlu; the fact that his place of work is Alperen Ocakları and that his Alperen Ocakları connection was Öztürk.
The lawyers of the slained victim think that the killing of the journalist on January 19, 2007 is not “a murder planned together by a few young men and executed in spite of the authorities; they claim that the local security units supported this group.
İstanbul Police Department under investigation; except Cerrah
The court did not see the need to connect the ongoing trials of the two police officers in Samsun, a Black Sea town near Trabzon, and the two gendarmerie officers in Trabzon with the hearings of the Dink trial. The police officers are accused of dereliction of duty, as they had their picture taken with the accused triggerman O.S. and the gendarmerie officers are accused with not preventing the murder and hiding the evidence.
Following the lack of jurisdiction decision by Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office, Fatih Public Prosecutor’s Office, also in Istanbul province, had opened an investigation into the involvement of Istanbul’s chief of police Celalettin Cerrah and the other Istanbul police department officers who are accused of not taking into consideration the warnings before the Dink murder.
Recently, it had made it into the headlines that the Provincial administrative Council of the Istanbul Governorship allowed the investigation proceed only for Ahmet İlhan Güler, the Head of the Intelligence Office for the Istanbul Police Department, and the six police officers but kept Cerrah out of it.
Upon hearing the confession “It was not us, but our superiors who neglected their duties” of the two gendarmerie officers who are tried for dereliction of duty in Trabzon, the lawyers of Dink family petitioned the Istanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office for having Trabzon’s former Gendarmerie Regiment Commander Colonel Ali Öz and nine gendarmerie officers brought to the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office to be tried in the murder case.
The purpose of the lawyers is to combine the trials of police and gendarmerie officers in Samsun and Trabzon and perhaps the possible trial of Cerrah and the officers tied to him in Istanbul with the Dink’s murder trial. (EÖ/GG)
