Daily Birgün And Journalist Tahmaz Under Investigation For Interviewing PKK

An investigation has been launched against journalist and activist Hakan Tahmaz, licence holder for daily Birgün Bülent Yılmaz and general director of the same newspaper İbrahim Çeşmecioğlu for publishing an interview with Murat Karayılan, one of the most important authorities in the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK). The interview was conducted in Kandil, the Nothern Iraq region where the PKK headquarters is.  

Birgün was seized on August 9, 2008, for “allocating space to PKK’s opinions” by publishing Tahmaz’s interview with Karayılan titled “Tek Taraflı Ateşkes Sorunu Büyütüyor” (One sided ceasefire is making the problem worse).

Karayılan: We want to do politics as PKK

Hakan Tahmaz had written in his interview that although Karayılan had emphasized that the person on the street did not want to live in violence any longer, he had also told that they would have continued with what they had called “the legitimate defensive war” activities.

The interview had also stated that “they were not interested in having a separate state, they were on the mountains because the Kurdish problem was denied, the Democratic Society Party was an intermediate step for them, they wanted to do politics as PKK and they did not see any contradiction in going to continue with their “legitimate defensive war.”

Tahmaz: The Kurdish Problem is not known in all its details

Tahmaz and Çaşmecioğlu gave their statements to one of the Istanbul High Criminal Court prosecutors on August 25 and Altınbıyık did the same two days later on August 27.

In his statement to the accusation of “making propaganda for a terrorist organization”, Tahmaz said that he had simply doing journalism by sharing his views with his readers.

Telling the prosecutor that he was involved with numerous initiatives to help end the armed conflict that has been going on for four, five years now and was writing a book about the subject, Tahmaz argued that Turkey had to face the Kurdish Problem and the PKK, one of the sides in the Kurdish Problem and that public did not know the problem in all its details.

“Investigation is another way of saying ‘do not conduct activities for peace’”

“We went to the region to inform the public. I did not only go to Kandil. My northern Iraq observations were published later. They were not limited with the interview. I believe that the reality of the PKK needs to be seen in all its details. I am working towards a solution without weapons.”

“This is another way of saying ‘do not conduct activities for peace’. In my interview I asked when these weapons were going to stop firing. I believe that the bigger problem is avoiding facing the war that has been going on for thirty years and that this is taking Turkey to a disaster.” (EÖ/TB)