HNN Huntingtonnews, WV
Jan 21 2007

Editorial: Murder of Journalist in Turkey Draws International
Condemnation

At the risk of sounding politically incorrect, we have to remark
that there seems to a recurring theme in many Muslim countries – and
countries with a sizable Muslim minority — that any criticism of the
state – and by extension Islam — should ultimately end in murdering
the critic.

We say this in sorrow at the shooting death in Istanbul on Friday,
Jan. 19, 2007 of an outspoken Turkish-Armenian journalist who
repeatedly clashed with Turkish authorities over recognition of the
early 20th Century slaughter of Armenians. Amnesty International and
many other governments and non-governmental organizations condemned
the slaying of Hrant Dink.

The genocide of Christian Armenians by Ottoman Muslims during World
War I is an historical fact – even if one dismisses as myth a quote
attributed to Adolf Hitler in 1939 to the effect that who now
remembers the Armenian massacres, supposedly paving the way for the
Holocaust of Europe’s Jews.

News reports said that Dink, who as editor of a Turkish-Armenian
newspaper was the leading voice for his ethnic community, died a week
after he wrote about threats from unknown forces who he said regarded
him "an enemy of the Turks."

Hundreds of people marched Friday evening from Istanbul’s central
Taksim Square to the offices of Dink’s Agos weekly newspaper, near
the spot on a sidewalk where he was shot in the head. They held
candles and posters of him; a somber silence was interrupted
periodically with applause and chants for "the brotherhood of
peoples."

Istanbul Gov. Muammer Guler said late Friday that three people were
detained in connection with the shooting, but no additional details
were released.

The slaying is likely to further darken Turkey’s reputation for
repressing critics of the government or of the country’s tight
control on how its turbulent past is portrayed. The murder by
Mohammed Bouyen of Theo van Gogh in the Netherlands on Nov. 2, 2004
and the violence following the publication of the Danish cartoons
allegedly ridiculing Islam come to mind.

Hrant Dink, 52, was part of a group of writers and thinkers,
including Nobel Literature laureate Orhan Pamuk and novelist Elif
Safak, who have been tried on charges of insulting their country’s
"Turkishness" under an ambiguous law promoted by hard-line
nationalists, according to reports in the L.A. Times. Los Angeles is
home to the nation’s largest Armenian-American community, so the
death of Dink resonates strongly in the region.

While most of the defendants, including Pamuk, were cleared, Dink was
convicted in 2005 for writing articles that criticized the law and
explored questions of Turkish and Armenian identity. He was sentenced
to a 6-month prison term, which was suspended, according to the Times
account.

The contrast to a free nation in the Middle East — Israel, where a
spirited and rambunctious press is free to write about every aspect
of Israel and Judaism — is outlined sharply. Turkey’s entry into the
European Union has been delayed because of the lack of respect for
human rights and free speech in the overwhelmingly Muslim nation.
Turkey has diplomatic relations with Israel, but so does Russia,
where journalists are also an endangered species.

If there is an optimistic note in this barbaric incident, it is in
the condemnation by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of
Dink’s "traitorous" and "disgraceful" murder.

"Bullets have been fired at free thought and our democratic life,"
Erdogan said at a news conference. He urged calm.

Fine words, but they don’t bring back a martyred journalist.

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