Final Plea Expected for Coming Hearing

The trial against Ogün Samast, triggerman suspect of the murder of Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, has reached its final stage.

At the fourth hearing of the trial on Wednesday (25 May), the Sultanahmet (Istanbul) 2^nd Juvenile High Criminal Court decided to allow Public Prosecutor Ali Demir time till 17 June to prepare his final plea.

Aspiring university studies

Samast brought two books to the Wednesday hearing, i.e. "What we did not do for this homeland" written by Şükran Pakkan and "An Armenian" by Adem Yavuz Arslan. The latter work deals with the murder of Dink, then Editor-in-Chief of the Armenian Agos newspaper, on 19 January 2007. Samast said that he desired to finish high school in adult education and study sociology at university afterwards.

"Is a juvenile court going to find out what a State Security Court could not reveal?"

Defendant Samast summarized the period of time that eventually lead to the murder of journalist Dink. Judge İsmet Gülbiçim asked him if all the events leading to the crime were coincidences. Samast replied, "Coincidence. Chance. Hap. Is something that did not emerge within 4.5 years going to emerge now? They should have a look at the video records. Is a juvenile court going to find out what a State Security Court was not able to find?"

Murder trial on 30 May

The Dink murder trial including 19 defendants who were allegedly involved in the killing will continue before the Istanbul 14^th High Criminal Court on 30 May. (EÖ/VK)