AN ARTIST WHO PORTRAYED TURKEY’S PREMIER AS A DOG HAS FLED THE COUNTRY

/PanARMENIAN.Net/
02.07.2009 11:23 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ An artist who was cleared of mocking Turkey’s prime
minister by portraying him as a dog has fled the country after hearing
his acquittal has been overturned. Michael Dickinson, 59, returned
home to County Durham after hearing a late-night TV report last week
saying the acquittal had been quashed and a new trial was pending. "I
was shocked. I couldn’t believe it," he said. "I caught a plane out as
soon as I could, leaving most of my possessions behind, including my
books, furnishings and computer." "I was sad to leave after 23 years
in Turkey, but I don’t fancy another taste of Turkish hospitality
in incarceration." Dickinson is expecting the trial to go ahead in
his absence, and will be represented by his lawyer. In September the
artist was cleared by a court in Istanbul after a judge decided the
controversial collage of Tayyip Erdogan was art and not insulting,
The Times reported. The piece, called Good Boy, showed Erdogan as a
dog with a stars and stripe leash and nuclear missile tail.