SUSPECTS IN JOURNALIST’S KILLING CAME FROM A HOTBED OF TURKISH ULTRANATIONALIST SENTIMENT
By Sebnem Arsu
Lynsey Addario for The New York Times
New York Times, NY
Feb 8 2007
TRABZON, Turkey – With fishing boats pouring in and out of a busy
harbor, white minibuses crisscrossing in all directions and shopping
streets bustling, this regional capital nestled on the Black Sea
appears to be a vibrant city.
But beneath the colorful shopping malls filled with trendy clothes
and chic cafes, the poverty, unemployment and lack of opportunity
that afflicts many of Turkey’s cities is crushing here – especially
for young people.
All eight suspects in the plot to kill Hrant Dink, a nationally
prominent editor, came from nearby, and links to other ultranationalist
crimes here are beginning to emerge.
Mr. Dink, an Armenian Turk who was an outspoken commentator on
the country’s handling of minority rights and was once convicted of
insulting the Turkish identity for an article he wrote, was killed on
Jan. 19 in Istanbul. Ogun Samast, 17, a high school dropout who has
confessed to the killing, was arrested with seven others in connection
with the crime.
The attack has caused a harsh examination in Trabzon of how the
authorities handled early hints of this and similar crimes.
The government dismissed Trabzon’s provincial governor and police
chief in the wake of Mr. Dink’s killing, and the Interior Ministry
is investigating what might have gone wrong in the handling of an
informant’s tips before the crime was committed.
According to NTV television, the informant, Erhan Tuncel, told the
police about plots to kill Mr. Dink on four occasions in the last
year. The first tip was passed along to Istanbul, where the police made
inquiries, but the later tips were not, the television report said.
Other prominent crimes here have had a common motivation of extremism
in upholding nationalist values. A local McDonald’s restaurant
was bombed in 2004, chosen as a Western target, and there was an
attempted lynching of a group of leftist protesters and killings of two
professors from the local university and of a Roman Catholic priest,
the Rev. Andreas Santaro.
But it was not until the police found personal links between Mr.
Samast, the confessed killer of Mr. Dink, and Yasin Hayal, an
ultranationalist convicted of the McDonald’s bombing, that a web of
connections between various crimes came to light. Mr. Hayal is being
charged with inciting the Dink killing.
Mr. Tuncel is a mysterious figure. He was implicated in the McDonald’s
bombing but then was given his freedom to act as an informer. There
are reports that he tipped off the police four times to the threat
to Mr. Dink, but he is also being held as a suspect.
In addition, the fact that Mr. Samast and the killer of Father Santaro,
a 16-year-old high school dropout, were both under age at the times of
their crimes suggests that someone may have been urging young people
to commit crimes, knowing that they would escape harsher penalties
if caught.
But so far the police have not arrested any older or more established
figures in these crimes.
For some of the city’s youth, the region’s culture of bravado and
machismo seems to make a breeding ground for anger.
"Black Sea people are dynamic, restless, energetic and have strong
heroic feelings," said Adem Solak, a prison therapist who works with
the youth who killed Father Santaro. "Their environment, built on a
single culture without interaction with diverse ethnicities, creates
a greater potential for reaction to social issues."
Expressions of anger are easy to come by, as are defenses of Mr.
Samast and the killing of Mr. Dink.
"I don’t think brother Ogun did wrong," said Murat, 19, a university
dropout who, like many interviewed, refused to give his last name,
saying he feared police harassment. "We heard that the Armenian
cursed our blood, which we cannot accept." He and his friend Hasan,
18, chain-smoking at a cafe near the town center, said they had known
Mr. Samast for years in Pelitli, the suburb where all three grew up.
They praised nationalism with a religious undertone.
But Murat hesitated before saying whether Mr. Dink deserved to die.
"If television earlier had said what a good person he was, like they
do now, no, actually," he said after a moment of reflection.
In Pelitli, a young man giving his name as Serkan said Mr. Samast
was a troublemaker, but one who would have needed guidance to commit
such a crime. "I bet he had no idea who Hrant Dink was," Serkan said,
"because he had nothing to do with newspapers or politics, but loved
stirring up violence, starting fights on small matters."
A colleague, who gave his name as Hamdi and said he was 21, went on
from there. "What would you expect in a town where there are no social
activities for young people, no job opportunities, and everyone around
you loves to cause trouble?" he said.
The problem with Mr. Samast was not his politics, they said, but his
failure to leave it to the government to defend the nation.
The city was populated by Greeks, Armenians and Abkhazians when it
was a trading center, but after Turkish independence in the 1920s,
the Greeks left, and Trabzon became overwhelmingly Muslim and
Turkish. Since then the people here have been seen as having strong
nationalist and religious values. Use of weapons adds another dimension
to the pride of individual bravery.
"We cannot do without weapons," Asim Aykan, a member of Parliament
from Trabzon, said on NTV. "They are a special part of the culture
of our society. We cannot express our joy without firing guns. That
is the culture, which is beautiful but can also turn bad."
On a cold and windy Sunday after Mr. Dink was killed, crowds attending
a game at the soccer stadium here waved Turkish flags. One group
opened a huge banner saying: "We’re from Trabzon. We’re Turks.
We’re all Mustafa Kemals" – a reference to the founder of the modern
Turkish state.
That was a rebuttal to the many thousands of Turks in Istanbul who
attended Hrant Dink’s funeral carrying signs that read: "We’re all
Hrant Dinks. We’re all Armenians."
Nationalism of the former sort "embraces intolerance towards the other,
superiority over minorities and not only fear but also hatred toward
the foreigner," said Professor Ali Carkoglu of Sabanci University
in Istanbul.
The feeling is stirred up by global events like the war in Iraq,
the Danish cartoons satirizing Muhammad and the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict. Then there is Turkey’s ambition to join the European Union,
which has brought many changes.
That long process has its ups and downs, said Melek Goregenli, a
professor of political psychology at Ege University in Izmir. She
said that it "helped bring unspoken thoughts to the fore, made them
more visible, but at the same time made those who spoke out as targets
for those who couldn’t tolerate free expression of thought and equal
rights for everyone."
But even in this city, there are people who try to revive the feeling
of unity among ethnic groups that lived together for centuries. In
a historic building once used as a prison, a local theater company
performed an Armenian comedy classic the weekend after Mr. Dink was
killed. There had been several sold-out shows, and the seats were
sold out for that performance too.
But because of fears about security, the theater was empty, Necati
Zengin, the director of the play, said in a sad and frustrated tone.
"What we have to understand is that if Ogun and others had been
theatergoers, Hrant would have been still alive," he said.