TURKEY: PARLIAMENT APPROVES REFORM FREEDOM EXPRESSION

Agenzia Giornalistica Italia
April 30 2008
Italy

(AGI) – Ankara, April 30 – The Turkish parliament has approved the
much-awaited reform of the law that limits freedom of expression. The
article has been used to accuse hundreds of writers (among whom
Nobel Prize winner Orhan Pamuk and writer Elif Safak), the EU had
also asked to have the article changed.

Article 301 punished those who "insulted the Turkish identity" with 3
years in prison. The amendment was approved with 250 votes in favour,
and 65 against, and substitutes the vague concept of "Turkish identity"
by "the Turkish nation", and reduced the penalty from 3 to 2 years. The
clause regarding an insult in a foreign country has been removed;
and the ‘approval’ of the justice ministry is needed to start a trial
against a person accused of violating article 301. The reform should
keep nationalist prosecutors from accusing intellectuals of criticising
the Turkish State. In the past two years, 1,800 people have been
sentenced on this article; among them the Armenian journalist Hrant
Dink, who due to this trial has become a target of internationalist
groups and in 2007 he was killed by an adolescent. Many believe that
the reform isn’t sufficient and that the law should be completely
abolished. But government party ‘Justice and Development’ suggested
the reform, unwilling to abolish the article claiming that other
European countries have similar laws.