The International Publishes Association (IPA) rewarded the editor-in chief of Dosh Magazine from Chechnya, Israpil Shovkhalov, with their Freedom to Publish Award. This year's special award went to İrfan Sancı from the Turkish Sel Publishing Company. The prize giving ceremony was held on the occasion of the Istanbul TÜYAP Book Fair.
Sancı is facing imprisonment of up to nine years. Charges of "obscenity" are being pressed against the publisher on the grounds of three works of literature he introduced to the Turkish market. In his speech at the ceremony, Sancı deplored the "troublesome situation" in Turkey regarding the prosecution of texts that are acknowledged as world cultural heritage. "This morning I was in court and the prosecutor requested my punishment, tonight I receive an award", he said.
Sancı told bianet that the Prime Ministerial Board for the Protection of Children from Harmful Publications issued a report stating that the (adult) books subject to the trial against him were found to be contrary to the public moral.
Smith-Simonsen: ECHR decisions should be considered
The Turkish publisher was given his prize by Bjorn Smith-Simonson, Chair of the IPA Freedom to Publish Committee. Smith-Simonson reminded the fact that Turkey was sentenced by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in February in regard to the book "The Eleven Thousand Rods" by Guillaume Apollinaire. He criticized the trial on Apollinaire's book "Adventures of the Young Don Juan" opened under charges of "obscenity" shortly after the ECHR's conviction as unacceptable. "In this situation, the difficulties faced by Sel Publishing become even more bewildering", he said.
Çetin Tüzüner, President of the Turkish Publishers Association (TYB), pointed out that despite positives steps towards more freedom, 27 publishers were tried between 2008 and 2010; 30 books were the subject of convictions in the same period of time.
The Chair of the TYB Freedom to Publish Committee and Deputy Head of the Human Rights Association (İHD), Ragıp Zarakolu, pointed in particular to the situations of Bedri Adanır, Erdoğan Akhanlı, Suzan Zengin and Muharrem Erbey as examples for writers, publishers and activists who were detained in recent times.
Zarakolu also mentioned Ahmet Önal from Peri Publishing and Muzaffer Erdoğdu from Pencere Publishing who are both on the doorstep to jail. "There have been huge problems with letters and alphabets in Turkey for many years. We have to free the letters so that we can try to relieve our country that is rich in believes from poverty and deprivation", Zarakolu said.
Referring to the killed Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink and the slain Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, Zarakolu claimed, "These plots must be stopped; otherwise this kind of incidents will happen incessantly".
Laureate Shovkhalov demanded to find the murderers of Politkovskaya. He continued, "We set off on this road together. Death took her away from us. With this award, we will go on invigorated".
Sanci stands trial before the Istanbul 2nd Criminal Court of First Instance for having published Ben Mila's book "The Fairy's Pendulum"; Guillaume Apollinaire's "Adventures of the Young Don Juan"; and "Letters of a Learned and Well-mannered French Bourgeois Lady" by P.V., facing up to nine years in jail. (EÖ/VK)
