By SELCAN HACAOGLU
Associated Press Writer
December 29, 2005, 2:22 PM EST
ANKARA, Turkey — Turkish prosecutors decided Thursday not to file new charges against the country’s best known novelist for allegedly denigrating Turkey’s armed forces, but the writer still faces charges that he insulted “Turkishness,” said lawyers who sought his trial on both accusations.
Nationalist lawyers had petitioned prosecutors to file criminal charges against Orhan Pamuk for reportedly telling German newspaper Die Welt in October that the military threatened democratization in Turkey.
European officials have criticized the trial Pamuk is facing for comments he made about the massacre of Armenians and recent fighting in Kurdish areas, and called on Turkey to do more to protect free speech. Some have warned it may jeopardize Turkey’s efforts to join the EU.
Prosecutors decided there were no grounds to try Pamuk for insulting the military, said nationalist lawyer Kemal Kerincsiz.
The prosecutors based their decision on a European human rights convention protecting free speech and on a section of Turkey’s penal code that says remarks made within the spirit of criticism are not a crime. The law draws a distinction between criticism and insult.
Kerincsiz said he would appeal the decision Friday.
“It is of course not possible for the prosecutors to make a sound decision under so much pressure,” said Kerincsiz. “We’ve come to the point where we’re no longer able to protect our national values. Where will it all end?”
Kerincsiz said the army was portrayed as the enemy of democracy, calling it a “grave insult.”
Pamuk reportedly told Die Welt: “I don’t see (the ruling, Islamic-rooted) Justice and Development Party as a threat to Turkish democracy. Unfortunately, the threat comes from the army, which sometimes prevents democratic development.”
The novelist still faces charges for telling a Swiss newspaper in February that “30,000 Kurds and 1 million Armenians were killed in these lands, and nobody but me dares to talk about it.”
The remarks highlighted two of the most painful episodes in Turkish history: the massacre of Armenians during World War I — which Turkey insists was not a planned genocide — and recent guerrilla fighting in Turkey’s overwhelmingly Kurdish southeast.
On Wednesday, Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul acknowledged that charges brought against Pamuk had tarnished the country’s image abroad and said laws that limit freedom of _expression may be changed. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan also said laws could be changed if there were serious flaws.
It was the first time the government indicated it could amend laws making it a crime to insult Turkey. But officials said the government would likely wait for the outcome of the trial against Pamuk and dozens of others before moving to amend the laws.
“This is a new law, let’s see how it works, what the outcomes are,” Erdogan said. “If there are serious problems, then of course the legislature will sit down, make a new assessment and take a new decision.”
In an interview published Thursday, Pamuk said the government must expand freedom of _expression if it wants to win EU membership.
“For a country to enter the EU, there has to be full respect of minority rights, freedom of thought and _expression,” Pamuk told Aksam newspaper. “If you drag your feet and make cosmetic changes … then this won’t do. To believe that, you would need to be a child.”
* ___
Associated Press writer Suzan Fraser contributed to this report.
Yorumlar kapatıldı.