Kurdish Journalist Vedat Kurşun Sentenced to 3 Years
The Diyarbakır 4th High Criminal Court handed down a three-year prison sentence to detained Vedat Kurşun, former editorial manager of the Azadiya Welat newspaper publishing in Kurdish, on the grounds of "spreading propaganda for the PKK", the militant Kurdistan Workers' Party.
In the hearing on 30 March, the court based its decision on articles published in the newspaper's issues of 11 and 12 August 2007.
Headline "Respect to the fighters for freedom" penalized
Reasons for Kurşun's conviction were several items published in the issue of 11 August 2007. Those were the announcement of the death of Mazhar İlbasan, Demirci Taştekin and Vural Soydemir, members of the People's Defence Forces (HPG), an armed wing of the PKK, as the result of clashes in Tunceli; a poem for PKK members written by Nesih Özcan and a notice saying "We are educated in front of fighters for freedom. The Patriotic 'Norşin' in Mersin"
Further reasons were given based on the issue of the following day, since it included a long article about imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan with his photograph. The article reported about Öcalan's close co-operation with the PKK organizations PDK and YNK in Iraq, his opinion that it was impossible for these organizations to leave the PKK and that Turkey should understand this very well.
Reporting Öcalan's words resulted in prison sentence
In the article subject to Kurşun's conviction, Öcalan said that help was needed for the Kurds to receive all their rights and that an alliance with Massoud Barzani and Celal Talabani would be formed in case the rights would not be granted. "If this does not work out either, we would address America and Israel", Öcalan was quoted.
Detained defendant Kurşun was brought to the hearing from the Diyarbakır D Type Prison. He said to his defence, "I do not know who the authors of these works are. The publications were not made for organizational propaganda. I made the news within the framework of freedom of information and publication".
However, after a brief intermission, President Judge Hüsamettin Otçu decreed for sentencing Kurşun to three years imprisonment by reason of violating the Anti-Terror Act (law no. 3713). Kurşun was taken back to prison after the pronouncement of the judgement. He has been in detention for more than a year since 30 January 2009.
Facing more time in detention
On 18 March, the Diyarbakır 5th High Criminal Court decided to keep Kurşun in detention until the hearing on 6 May.
Kurşun is currently tried in 32 different cases. Court Prosecutor Yakup Yar demanded prison sentence of up to five years under charges of "propaganda for an illegal organization" on the grounds of criminal contents in a total of 103 issues of the newspaper. Furthermore, prosecutor Yar requested imprisonment of up to another ten years for "membership in an illegal organization".
Kurşun is facing a total prison sentence of up to 525 years due to the prosecutor's demand of a105 counts sentence under charges of "spreading propaganda for a terrorist organization" and "membership of a terror organization" based on the Anti-Terror Act. Prosecutor Yar referred in his demand to certain terms used in the articles such as "Kurdistan", "guerrilla", "martyr", "leader of the Kurdish people" or "respectable Öcalan" besides the publishing of notes made during an interview with Öcalan, criticism of the conditions of detention in Imralı prison where Öcalan serves his sentence and announcements of PKK executives. (EÖ/VK)