PAMUK’S LAWYER SLAMS TURKISH JUSTICE MINISTER
Reuters, UK
Sept 29 2006
ANKARA (Reuters) – A lawyer for best-selling novelist Orhan Pamuk
chided Turkey’s justice minister on Friday for suggesting his client
was to blame for the controversy surrounding an article of the penal
code blasted by the EU.
The liberal daily Radikal this week quoted Justice Minister Cemil Cicek
as saying Pamuk had caused Turkey much trouble by "acting unethically",
first confirming and later denying comments attributed to him about
Turkish massacres of Armenians.
His comments sparked a case under article 301 that makes it a crime to
insult Turkish identity. Though Pamuk was acquitted on a technicality,
his trial drew condemnation from rights groups and the European Union
as a violation of free speech.
In an open letter published in Friday’s Radikal, lawyer Haluk Inanici
denied Cicek’s suggestion that Pamuk had ever retracted his comment
that a million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds had been killed on Turkish
territory.
"In saying our client has brought down much trouble on Turkey, is
it your wish that people, intellectuals in this society not express
their views?" Inanici asked Cicek.
"Is it ethical behavior to avoid a proper discussion of article 301?
As justice minister, is it not your duty to prepare a climate for
discussion?"
The lawyer accused Cicek of exploiting Pamuk’s name for political
purposes and to divert attention away from the "anti-democratic
and anachronistic" nature of article 301, which the EU and Turkish
liberals want to see modified or scrapped.
"It is not ethical to try to belittle our client and hold him
responsible for implementation of 301," Inanici said.
Turkey’s centre-right government, which began EU entry talks last
year, says more time is needed to assess whether it is necessary
to change article 301. Cicek, a nationalist-minded conservative,
is known to oppose any revision of the article.
Pamuk, author of novels such as "Snow" and "My Name is Red", is one
of a large number of writers, journalists and scholars prosecuted
under article 301, though none has yet gone to jail.
An Istanbul court last week dismissed a case against leading woman
novelist Elif Shafak for comments made by her fictional characters,
also on the Armenian issue.
Turkey fiercely denies claims that 1.5 million Armenians perished in
World War One in a systematic "genocide" by Ottoman Turkish forces.
It says both Christian Armenians and Muslim Turks died in partisan
fighting that raged at that time.