![Something is missing in the Hrant Dink murder ruling
Five years ago, Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was shot dead in broad daylight on the sidewalk of a busy Istanbul street, outside the offices of his newspaper, Agos. This Tuesday, 17 January, the murder trial finally came to a close, with one of the 19 defendants receiving a life sentence on an incitement conviction, and two sentenced to twelve and a half years for assisting murder. Aside from a couple of other convictions, all minor, the decision was predominated by acquittals. Most significantly, all defendants were acquitted on charges of belonging to an armed organisation, since, the court ruled, there was no criminal organisation to speak of. The gunman, who was seventeen at the time of the crime, had been sentenced to 22 years imprisonment by a juvenile court last year.
Hrant Dink’s murder was the culminating point of a persecution campaign that can be traced back to February 2004, when he published claims to the effect that Sabiha Gökçen, the adopted daughter of Atatürk and the first woman war pilot of the Turkish Republic, was of Armenian descent. Dink’s claim provoked a public statement from the Chief of Staff, the highest echelon of the Turkish army. A few days later he was summoned to the Istanbul Governor’s Office and “warned” by two people who were introduced to him as “friends” of the then Deputy Governor. Three and a half years after the assassination, the Intelligence Service admitted that these two people were its operatives.
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Something is missing in the Hrant Dink murder ruling
Five years ago, Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was shot dead in broad daylight on the sidewalk of a busy Istanbul street, outside the offices of his newspaper, Agos. This Tuesday, 17 January, the murder trial finally came to a close, with one of the 19 defendants receiving a life sentence on an incitement conviction, and two sentenced to twelve and a half years for assisting murder. Aside from a couple of other convictions, all minor, the decision was predominated by acquittals. Most significantly, all defendants were acquitted on charges of belonging to an armed organisation, since, the court ruled, there was no criminal organisation to speak of. The gunman, who was seventeen at the time of the crime, had been sentenced to 22 years imprisonment by a juvenile court last year.
Hrant Dink’s murder was the culminating point of a persecution campaign that can be traced back to February 2004, when he published claims to the effect that Sabiha Gökçen, the adopted daughter of Atatürk and the first woman war pilot of the Turkish Republic, was of Armenian descent. Dink’s claim provoked a public statement from the Chief of Staff, the highest echelon of the Turkish army. A few days later he was summoned to the Istanbul Governor’s Office and “warned” by two people who were introduced to him as “friends” of the then Deputy Governor. Three and a half years after the assassination, the Intelligence Service admitted that these two people were its operatives.
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