A GROUP of Turkish Cypriot journalists marched on the north’s ‘parliament’ yesterday morning in protest at legal charges brought against several of their colleagues by the Turkish military.
The action followed the charging of five journalists and the Kibris Media Group general secretary with “insulting and ridiculing” the Turkish army in articles published following a police crackdown on a pro-solution demonstration in March 2003.
The charges are a recent addition to hundreds of outstanding court cases against dozens of journalists in the north, many of which will be held in military courts.
The journalists delivered a declaration and petition to the ‘parliament speaker’ Fatma Ekenoglu and then marched to the statue of Dr Fazil Kucuk, the first leader of the Turkish Cypriot community under the Cyprus Republic and himself a journalist.
The defiant declaration issued by the Turkish Cypriot Union of Journalists said its members would “never be silenced” by the action of those wishing to gag the press, and called for an urgent review of the laws on freedom of expression.
“When the Turkish Cypriots voted yes in the referendum, they also voted yes to living under the socio-economic structure of the EU. How, then, can those who fail to understand what this means, or do not wish to understand, use the law to stand in the way of the will of the people and attempt to obstruct their freedom of expression?” the declaration asked.
The union accused those bringing the charges of attempting to “turn the tide of history” and “return us to the dark ages”.
They called on ‘parliament’ to back them in their call for an immediate review of laws on the freedom of expression and bring them into line with EU norms.
“We cannot imagine that any party or any of the MPs in parliament would object to such a move,” it added.
On Wednesday, police in the north read 48 more charges to journalists at Sener Levent’s daily, Afrika.
The charges are said to relate to articles written in 2001 and add to the hundreds of outstanding charges on which Levent and the paper are yet to be tried. The newest charges accuse Levent and the paper of “ridiculing the TRNC, insulting members of the government and state apparatus, insulting Turkish Embassy staff and engendering hatred towards the [Turkish] military”.
Levent told the Cyprus Mail that if he was found guilty of these, he could face “around 250 years behind bars”.
Levent and a colleague at the then-Avrupa newspaper were sentenced to six months each in the state prison in 2001 for allegedly libellous comments they made in articles about Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash.
Levent believes the charges expose the “real face of the TRNC”
“Even if they do nothing else, the courts will never be able to get through all of the cases,” he said, adding that if found guilty of the charges he and his colleagues would go to prison “for thousands of years”.
Levent has threatened to send copies of all the charges against him and his paper to the UN and the EU asking for the two bodies to refrain from rewarding the north for voting ‘yes’ to the Annan plan “until it stops carrying such anti-democratic measures”.
He has also called for an EU observer to be present at his trials. His next scheduled appearance in court is next Thursday.
