One year from the murder of Hrant Dink and the case is not clear

Turkish people were shocked on the 19th January last year when Hrant Dink, editor-in-chief of the Armenian magazine Agos, was shot dead in Istanbul. Since the dreadful years of the early 1990s journalists have not been murdered in Turkey despite there has been other political murders.

After the murder of Hrant Dink Turkish people made it clear that they do not accept return to this period of fear. Instead they want reforms. Thousands of people marched in the streets of Istanbul in the day of Dink's funeral. Columnists in daily newspapers demanded that the case must be examined to the deepest bottom. Almost no one believed that seventeen years old Ogün Samast had acted alone.

There were speculations in Turkish mass media that the murder was arranged by a Trabson network. Trabson is a town by the Black Sea. There were doubts about the involvement of Jitem, the intelligence service of the gendarmerie. Some pictures in internet upset Turkish people. In one of them Dink's murderer Samast hold Turkish flag and posed with policemen who were smiling. In another picture Veli Kücük, a previous chairman of Jitem, was with Alparslan Arslan, who murdered the top judge in Ankara one and half years ago.

But police came to the conclusion that a group of friends murdered Dink on their own initiative.

When there is any scandal connected to the state, first the Turkish mass media demands proper survey about the case, but usually the processing then cools down without any results.

So it happened also with the murder of Hrant Dink. In January 2007 it was the main news topic for several days in Turkish mass media. But when the trial against Samast and his "friends" started in July, the main stream newspapers made about it only small stories.

"We are all Armenians" slogans were forgotten quickly. But similar white caps as shooter Samast had used became popular in the streets of Turkish towns. This is a sign of anti-Armenian feelings.

Veli Kücük, the ex-chief of jandarma, felt so insulted about the implications targeted to him that he filed a court case against the family of Hrant Dink and their advocate and demanded 5500 euro compensation from them. This trial started in September in Istanbul.

Due to his articles in Agos magazine Hrant Dink had been accused by Article 301 of the Turkish penal code. This article criminalises denigration of Turkishness. During two and half years 120 Turkish intellectuals have got a prison sentence due to this article. All prosecutions have not led to a verdict. For example prosecutor removed the trial of Nobel prize winning author Orhan Pamuk.

The trial against Hrant Dink continued still two months after his death.
Only a few days before his death Hrant Dink had contacted the governor of Istanbul and told about the death threats he had received. He did not get any help. Now the situation is different. The state has arranged bodyguards for twenty journalists and writers. Orhan Pamuk is one of them.

This is only the first step in solving the problems of freedom of expression in Turkey. The most important issue is reform or abolition of Article 301. Also the European Union demands this.
During the anniversary of Hrant Dink's murder Turkish politicians have remembered the issue. Justice minister Mehmet Ali Sahin told at the end of December about innovations coming soon. But they are very small, for example the phrase "Turkishness" is to be replaced by "the state of the Republic of Turkey". But the change of a few words does not solve this problem.

And by the way, in addition to Article 301 there are at least fourteen other laws which give tools for the authorities to limit the freedom of expression. If Article 301 will be abolished, the present restrictions may not continue by using the other laws.