THREE YEARS AFTER DINK ASSASSINATION
armradio.am
19.01.2010 11:11
Today is the 3rd anniversary of assassination of the founder and
editor of Turkish Armenian weekly Agos.
Three years after Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was
fatally shot outside his office by an ultranationalist teenager, the
investigation into his murder has stalled as the suspected perpetrator
and his immediate accomplices have been put on trial, but those who
masterminded the plot to kill him still wait to be revealed.
To mark the anniversary of Dink’s murder the Armenian Ministry of
Diaspora Affairs has initiated a visit to Tsitsernakaberd.
Dink was editor-in-chief of the bilingual Agos daily until he was
killed on Jan. 19, 2007. Lawyers representing the co-plaintiffs in
the Dink trial have long alleged that the murder was the doing of
Ergenekon, a clandestine group charged with plotting to overthrow the
government. In the latest hearing they also petitioned the 14th High
Criminal Court to contact the prosecutors investigating Ergenekon
to request a copy of the documents that describe the organization’s
schemes against religious minorities in Turkey.
At the last hearing of the Dink trial in October of last year
co-plaintiff lawyer Fethiye Cetin stated that Dink’s murder, along
with that of an Italian priest in 2006 and the 2007 slaying of
three Christians in Malatya, was part of an operation carried out
by Ergenekon.
Cetin also said that the acts of some Ergenekon suspects in turning
Dink into a target for ultranationalists were very "open." She
recalled that when Dink was facing charges under Turkish Penal Code
(TCK) Article 301, which then criminalized "insulting Turkishness,"
some of the people who are in jail now as alleged Ergenekon members
brought crowds of protestors and even attacked Dink and his supporters
as they entered and left the courtroom, Today’s Zaman reports.