TURKISH EDITOR MURDER SHOWS RISK FOR REPORTERS: GROUP

Reuters
Dec 21 2009

Mon Dec 21, 2009 1:07pm ESTISTANBUL (Reuters) – The murder of a Turkish
newspaper editor, gunned down in broad daylight as he walked to work,
shows the risks journalists still face there, Turkey’s journalism
association said on Monday.

Cihan Hayirsevener, editor of a regional newspaper in Bandirma
in northwest Turkey, was shot by an unidentified gunman on
Friday afternoon, in a scene reminiscent of the 2007 killing of
Turkish-Armenian writer Hrant Dink, murdered by an ultra-nationalist
on an Istanbul street.

"Journalists are neither safe nor free," said Zafer Atay,
secretary-general of the Turkish Journalists Association.

Hayirsevener was the first journalist since Dink to be killed for
what he wrote, Atay said, adding that the journalist had received
death threats after writing about the detention of people suspected
of corruption in a construction tender.

Press freedom in Turkey has come under renewed scrutiny since tension
rose last year between Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and the country’s
largest media group.

Dogan Yayin, which owns a series of prominent newspapers including
the daily Hurriyet and broadcaster CNN Turk, faces a record tax fine
of $3.3 billion in a case critics say is politically motivated.

The government denies this and says Dogan has acted like an opposition
party with its critical coverage. Erdogan had earlier urged his
supporters not to buy Dogan-owned newspapers.

EU aspirant Turkey has a history of limiting free speech, especially
on issues which continue to be seen in some quarters as a threat to
the modern Turkish republic.

The European Commission has urged Turkey to do more to protect
freedom of expression and the press. Discussion of the mass killings of
Armenians by Ottoman Turks in 1915 and political Islam are particularly
sensitive.