TURKEY’S PRESIDENT DEFENDS HUMAN RIGHTS RECORD
Gilbert Reilhac

The Scotsman, UK
Oct 4 2007

ABDULLAH Gul, the president of Turkey, yesterday defended its human
rights record, but said much remained to be done, including tackling
a law used to curb free speech.

The European Union, which Ankara hopes to join, has urged Turkey to
scrap Article 301 of its penal code, which makes it a crime to insult
Turkish national identity or state institutions. "Nobody is in prison
in Turkey today for expressing their ideas, but there are many more
things still to do," Mr Gul told the parliamentary assembly of the
Council of Europe in Strasbourg.

Mr Gul later said he wanted to see article 301 amended, noting it
had caused much damage to Turkey’s image as it negotiates for EU
membership.

Nationalist prosecutors in Turkey have used Article 301 against
writers, journalists and academics, including the Nobel Literature
laureate, Orhan Pamuk, although cases hardly ever end in convictions.

But the centre-right government of the prime minister, Tayyip Erdogan,
has resisted EU pressure to scrap or amend Article 301, saying it
would do so at its own pace.

Hrant Dink, a Turkish Armenian writer, was convicted under the
article. He spoke out on the Ottoman Turkish massacres of Armenians
in 1915 and was shot dead by an ultra-nationalist in January.

This article: 872007

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress