Arrested journalists in Turkey to publish newspaper

Journalists apprehended under the country’s anti-terror laws are planning to publish a newspaper called the “Arrested Journal” with contributions of other Turkish intellectuals.

The newspaper’s first issue will reach newsstands on July 28, the anniversary of the repeal of censure over the press in 1908.

“If an inch of progress is to be made in Turkey regarding the freedom of thought and expression, then anti-terror laws have to be entirely abolished. Since when has thought become a terrorist activity?” Necati Abay, the spokesperson for the Solidarity with Imprisoned Journalists Platform, or TGDP, recently told the Hürriyet Daily News in a telephone interview.

Some 60 journalists are currently in prison on anti-terror charges in Turkey, according to Abay, who said Turkey had managed to outscore China in this regard. The idea of publishing the newspaper was first advanced by the owner of Aram Publishing House, Bedri Adanır, who was arrested on anti-terror charges and jailed in Diyarbakır Prison, the TGDP spokesperson said.

The paper’s first issue will only feature the writings of arrested journalists, while future issues will also include the writings of other intellectuals from outside prisons, Abay said.

The aim is to create a newspaper without a fixed set of columnists, according to Abay. Instead, the writings of prominent intellectuals and journalists such as Yaşar Kemal, İsmail Beşikçi, Banu Güven, Ertuğrul Mavioğlu, Uğur Dündar, Murathan Mungan, Yıldırım Türker, Zülfü Livaneli and other writers will be featured in the paper from time to time.

The journal will be distributed as a supplement to other dailies, eliminating the need for other distribution channels, said the spokesperson.

The Arrested Journal is also counting on support from other media sources regarding content, typesetting, printing and distribution, including the Kurdish-language Azadiya Welat, as well as other dailies such as BirGün, Cumhuriyet, Evrensel, Özgür Gündem and Aydınlık.

 “It is more often papers with socialist leanings that support [us.] We want mainstream media to also lend their support [to us.] The mainstream media took notice of ongoing injustices only after Nedim Şener and Ahmet Şık were taken into custody. [They] turned a blind eye to the arrests of left-leaning journalists,” Abay said.

The idea of arrested journalists publishing their own journal is extremely fitting, said Ahmet Abakay, the president of the Ankara-based Contemporary Journalists Association, or ÇGD. Arrested journalists will then be able to address the public first hand.

“All arrested journalists will transmit their ideas to their readers freely and without any intermediaries or any discrimination. They will keep writing persistently,” Abakay said.

 The Turkish press today is in even more desperate straits than back during the aftermath of the 1980 coup, he said.

“[We] are almost going through a period of emergency rule; the state is casually imprisoning journalists with complete nonchalance and with no questions asked; this period will surely be remembered as a time [marked by] the oppression of the freedom of speech and expression,” Abakay said.

“Diyarbakır was the focal point of all the suffering. As such, there is a symbolic significance to the fact that this activism started there,” he added.

The Diyarbakır Prison was the scene of some of the most gruesome instances of torture that took place after the Sept. 12, 1980, military overthrow. The Culture Ministry recently decided to transform the infamous prison into a human rights museum.

The fundamental issue that sits at the heart of the problems afflicting the Turkish media has been the inability of journalists’ associations to cooperate and enter into dialogue with each other, Abakay said.

“It is difficult to foretell how much the newspaper will sell, but at least it will [represent] a critical stance,” said Aytekin Yılmaz, the mastermind of a literary project called the “Mahsus Mahal” (Reserved Locale) that helped young imprisoned writers write during the 1980s. Many contributors to that magazine have now become renowned authors today.

“Jails have unfortunately turned into spots for our intellectuals to gather in and produce [new] ideas, past and present,” said Yılmaz.

All thinking individuals with ideas have passed through prisons since the 1960s, he added, calling the prison journal “an extremely positive step, almost a point shot.”


/Hurriyet Daily News/