The Istanbul 12^th High Criminal Court acquitted Aysel Tuğluk, former deputy of the banned pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP), and closed another case against her by prescription.

Tuğluk stood accused of "spreading propaganda for the PKK", the militant Kurdistan Workers' Party, and of "praising crime and a criminal". The charges were based on the contents of the two articles entitled "Apo talks" published on 28 May 2004 and "Apo does not like the new name of the PKK" published on 27 May 2002. 'Apo' refers to PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, who is imprisoned on İmralı Island in the Sea of Marmara since 1999.

Court: No causal link to criminal offence

Tuğluk was acquitted of the charges related to the article "Apo talks" because the court was not convinced that Tuğluk "committed the crime imputed on her".

In the hearing, Tuğluk was represented by her lawyer Özan Kılıç who requested his client's acquittal on the grounds that the source of the words in question could not be confirmed, whereupon the court took the referring decision of acquittal.

Prosecutor: statute of limitations ran out

The same court also tried the second case in a subsequent session. A time period of 7.5 years passed since the article subject of the trial was published on 27 May 2002, thus the case was dropped by prescription.

Tuğluk was facing imprisonment for the article "Apo does not like the new name of the PKK" published in 2002 based on article 7/2 (assistance or propaganda for an illegal organization) of the Anti-Terror Law (TMY) and article 215 (defamation) of the Turkish Criminal Code (TCK).

In his final submission, prosecutor Mustafa Çavuşoğlu pointed out that the case file should be dropped since it exceeded its statute of limitation. The court decided in accordance with the prosecutor's request.

Politician Tuğluk got clear of prison sentences related to these two files. However, the former DTP deputy faces dozens of years of imprisonment in another case opened against her. (EÖ/VK)