Turkey drops case against novelist
http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/01/23/news/turkey.php
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/23/international/europe/23cnd-turkey.html
Turkey drops case against novelist
By Sebnem Arsu The New York TimesMONDAY, JANUARY 23, 2006
ISTANBUL An Istanbul court dropped charges against the acclaimed novelist Orhan Pamuk on Monday, ending a trial that put Turkey at odds with the European Union over freedom of speech.
Pamuk, whose works have been translated into dozens of languages, spoke in a newspaper interview about the mass killings of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire in 1915 and of the deaths of Kurds in Turkish operations against a separatist group in the 1980s. He was then prosecuted for "insulting Turkish identity."
On Sunday, the Justice Ministry authorized the local court to decide whether to proceed with the case, citing changes made to the penal code last year. On Monday, the lower court dropped the charges.
The court evidently expected a clear-cut decision from the Justice Ministry and decided to drop the case once the ministry did not insist that it continue.
The ruling was welcomed by European legislators. However, the lawyer for the novelist, Haluk Inanici, chided the court for basing its decision on bureaucratic shortcomings, rather than on freedom of expression.
"The court dropped the charges not because the trial violated the freedom of speech," he said, but because "there was a missing approval by the Justice Ministry to proceed with the trial."
Pamuk was facing a sentence of up to three years in jail if he was convicted of insulting the Turkish identity in the interview he gave to Das Magazine, a Swiss publication, last year.
When he talked about the mass killings of Armenians and the deaths of the Kurds in government operations against the separatist group PKK, he was addressing topics that remain thorny despite a widespread revision of the Turkish penal code last year.
Pamuk's novels include "My Name Is Red," and "The Black Book" and "Snow." His high profile in Europe and elsewhere prompted widespread opposition to his prosecution, an advantage that many intellectuals who face similar charges do not have, said Vecdi Sayar, general secretary of International PEN, a worldwide association of writers.
According to International PEN, about 70 intellectuals have been charged under Article 301 of the revised penal code that calls for punishment for public comments that "denigrate Turkishness, the government, the army and the memory of the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk."
"There are many people abroad who fail to see beyond Orhan Pamuk's trial," Sayar said. "Saving a writer like Orhan Pamuk from prosecution may stand as a symbolic example on its own. But it is not an overall resolution for other intellectuals and writers that still face similar charges in Turkey."
The governing Justice and Development Party, which worked to align Turkish laws with European standards before EU membership talks began in October, tried to appear impartial in handling Pamuk's case. But many senior government officials interpreted the heavy international criticism as an interference in the national judiciary system.
Sayar charged that the government feared losing the support of those nationalist constituents who oppose Pamuk's comments.
Televised pictures from Pamuk's first hearing in December showed armored policemen trying to save the 53-year-old novelist from a barrage of eggs and protesters who jumped on his vehicle, punching the windshield - scenes that displayed the nationalist anger.
"The Justice Ministry could have dropped the charges before the local court and spoken clearly about the necessities of freedom of speech," Sayar said. "But in fear of annoying the nationalist circles, they did not."
