TURKISH NATIONALIST CHARGED OVER ‘NO JEWS, NO ARMENIANS’ PLACARD
Monsters and Critics.com
Feb 15 2009
Ankara – The head of a Turkish nationalist group could face up to a
year in jail after being charged over a placard he put in his office
barring Jews and Armenians from entering, the Dogan news agency
reported on Monday.
‘No Jews or Armenians are allowed through this door. Dogs are free
to enter,’ read the sign that Niyazi Capa, general manager of the
Osman Gazi Culture Federation, placed in the window of his office
of the central Anatolian city of Eskisehir in January just after the
Israeli military began it’s three-week operation in Gaza.
Prosecutors have now charged Capa with ‘discrimination on the basic
of race or religion’, a crime punishable by between six months and
one year imprisonment.
Dogan said that Capa had denied the charges, telling prosecutors
investigating the case that he was not a racist and that he had no
problem with Armenian or Jewish people.
Capa’s alleged action in January co-incided with large-scale protests
across Turkey condemning the Israeli military operations in Gaza.
Whilst Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan made a number of extremely
critical speeches condemning Israel’s actions, including describing it
as a ‘stain on history’s page’, he specifically condemned the actions
of Capa, describing anti-Semitism as a ‘crime against humanity’.
Capa said that the sign’s reference to Armenians was in response
to a recent campaign by Turkish intellectuals to apologise for the
massacres of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during the First World War.
Capa defended his sign saying it was similar to one posted at the
door of a concert in France by the American rock band ‘System of a
Down’. Members of the band have in the past denied ever having posted
such a sign.
Capa’s trial will start at an Eskisehir magistrates court later
this year.