BÝA, Turkey
July 12 2006

Appeals Court Ratifies Dink Verdict

Court of Appeals General Council ratifies deferred 6 month prison
sentence for Armenian weekly "Agos" newspaper Editor-in-Chief Hrant
Dink voting to reject Appeals Prosecutor’s final opinion of
no-offence and request to quash decision..

BIA News Center
12/07/2006 Erol ONDEROGLU

BÝA (Ankara) – Turkey’s Court of Appeals General Council on Tuesday
ratified a deferred 6 month prison sentence passed for Armenian
weekly "Agos" newspaper Editor-in-Chief Hrant Dink by quashing an
Appeals Prosecutor’s final opinion that an offence calling for such
penalty had not been committed and the original verdict should be
striked down.

The conclusive decision rejecting the Prosecutor’s appeal and
approving Dink’s sentence was taken with 18 against 6 votes and
although the journalist’s 6 month imprisonment is deferred, it
approves a 2005 Court of First Instance verdict that established the
journalist’s "guilt".

Dink was found guilty in a controversial trial where opinions
expressed in his 2004 article series "The Armenian Identity"
published in Agos were found to be "insulting and ridiculing
Turkishness". "Subject to the verdict were Dink’s remarks "The
poisoned blood that will spill from Turks will be replaced by noble
blood of the Armenians who will create Armenia".

Dink was sentenced by an Istanbul court to 6 months jail on October
7, 2005 but the author’s prison term was deferred on condition that
he should not commit a similar offence for a period of five years.
The newspaper’s Editor Karin Karakasli was acquitted of the same
charges.

This May, the 9th Department of the Appeals Court cited "procedural
deficiencies" in the Dink case and overruled the deferred sentence
for the journalist. It also disagreed with the Court of Appeals Chief
Prosecutor’s previous evaluation that the local court verdict against
Dink should itself be overruled on grounds that "the physical and
moral conditions of an offence" had not taken place.

The Appeals Prosecutor had argued that the verdict against Dink was
result of a "mistaken evaluation". (EO/II/YE)

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