ANOTHER WRITER GOES ON TRIAL IN NEW BLOW TO TURKEY’S EU CREDENTIALS
Agence France Presse — English
September 19, 2006 Tuesday 1:44 AM GMT
A celebrated Turkish novelist goes on trial Thursday over her book
on the massacre of Armenians under the Ottoman Empire, casting fresh
doubts on Turkey’s democratic credentials just weeks before the EU
releases a key report on its troubled membership bid.
Elif Shafak, 35, is the latest in a string of intellectuals to
answer charges of "denigrating the Turkish national identity" under
an infamous penal code provision that has led the European Union to
question Turkey’s commitment to freedom of speech.
The case, in which Shafak risks up to three years in jail, has ignited
further criticism because the charges stem from remarks by fictional
Armenian characters in her best-selling novel "The Bastard of Istanbul"
or "Baba ve Pic" (The Father and the Bastard) in Turkish.
Article 301 has landed many other intellectuals in court, including
Turkey’s best-known writer Orhan Pamuk.
EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn urged Ankara in July to amend
Article 301 "in order to guarantee freedom of expression", after an
appeals court upheld a conviction against Turkish-Armenian journalist
Hrant Dink under the same provision, setting a precedent.
Dink’s six-month sentence was suspended, while the case against Pamuk
was dropped on a technicality. No one has so far gone to jail under
the article, but dozens of cases are pending.
"Article 301 is being used so heedlessly to crush people in
courtrooms," Dink said in February after he was acquitted in an
earlier case tried under the 301 clause.
"What needs to be done is repeal the article," he said.
Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul recently hinted the provision may be
amended as part of reforms that the government is planning to rush
through parliament before the European Commission gives its verdict on
Turkey’s progress towards membership in a crucial report on October 24.
Turkey’s accession talks are already in trouble over its rejection
to open its sea and air ports to Greek Cypriot use under a customs
union accord with the European Union.
The proceedings against Shafak were initiated after a complaint
filed by a nationalist lawyer notorious for relentlessly pursuing
before the courts intellectuals who dispute the official line on the
Armenian massacres.
Much to Turkey’s chagrin, the World War I killings have been recognized
as genocide by many countries and open debate of the issue often
drives nationalist sentiment into a frenzy.
It was unclear whether Shafak will be present in the courtroom Thursday
as she just gave birth to her first child, a girl, at the weekend.
"The Bastard of Istanbul", originally written in English, was
released here in March 2006 and quickly became a bestseller. It will
be published in the United States and Britain next year.
The novel moves between Istanbul and San Fransisco as it tells
the intertwined stories of four generations of Turkish women and
an Armenian-American family, the descendants of survivors of the
massacres.
Armenians assert that up to 1.5 million of their people were
slaughtered in what was a genocide between 1915 and 1917.
Turkey argues that 300,000 Armenians and at least as many Turks
died in civil strife when Armenians took up arms for independence in
eastern Anatolia and sided with Russian troops invading the crumbling
Ottoman Empire.
Shafak, who was born in France and spent her teenage years abroad as
the daughter of a Turkish diplomat, writes both in English and Turkish.
She is also an assistant professor at Arizona University’s Near
Eastern Studies department and divides her time between Turkey and
the United States.