TURKEY: Trial of Turkish biographer Ipek Calislar is postponed

A Turkish court adjourned on Thursday (October 5) the trial of a biographer charged with insulting the founder of modern Turkey in a case which has raised concerns about freedom of expression in a country seeking EU membership. The Istanbul court judge said the trial was postponed until December 16 due to technical reasons. Ipek Calislar faces up to 4-1/2 years in prison if convicted over a passage about Mustafa Kemal Ataturk in a biography on his wife "Latife Hanim" under a special law designed to protect the memory of the country's revered founder. The case is the latest in a series of trials based around issues of freedom of expression, which have attracted sharp criticism from the European Union. Calislar did not attend the opening hearing at a courthouse in the Istanbul suburb of Bagcilar. Prosecutors opened a case against Calislar in August after a complaint by a reader of the mass-circulation Hurriyet newspaper about an extract from the book which it published in June. The extract gives an account of Ataturk disguising himself in a chador, the head-to-toe black robe worn by many pious Muslim women, in order to flee with women and children from his besieged house in Ankara. He then returns with reinforcements to thwart an assassination attempt at the hands of the "Lame Osman" gang, a group which had guarded the area around Ataturk's house before the formation of an official guard. This previously unpublished story was based on an account given by Latife's sister Vecihe Ilmen to a group of friends. The editor of Hurriyet, Necdet Tatlican, was also on trial for publishing the extract. Tugrul Pekin, the plaintiff for the public court, says this trial does not mean a ban on freedom of speech. "I think it (to stand trial) is right if it is insult. Because this is not an idea it is an insult. I also criticise Ataturk as well. Everyone has something to be criticised on, no-one is God. But this is an insult," Pekin said. In the indictment, state prosecutor Ali Cakir says the passage goes beyond the expression of a view and insults the memory of Ataturk without any basis in historical records. "The accounts of him being a cowardly person, forced to flee Cankaya in a woman's clothing go beyond criticism and the expression of thought...to insult Ataturk's memory through the media," the indictment said.

ITN Source | October 6, 2006

Tags:. .union. .judge. .speech. .seeking. .eu