20
October 2006
2. "Orhan Pamuk’s Nobel Prize throws Turkish nationalists online only", we may have our own views about Orhan Pamuk’s novels, but there can be no doubt that Pamuk richly deserves the prize both in literary terms and as a man with deeply-held views which he is not afraid to express regardless of the consequences.
3. "Kurdish linguistic rights report, 2006", submitted to the Translation and Linguistic Rights Committee of the International PEN at the Ohrid.
4. "Chomsky's Publishers On Trial", publishers of the translation of Chomsky's "Role of Mass Media: Manufacturing of Consent" tell court it shouldn't be them facing the bench. Publisher Tas, translator Abadoglu, editor Tosun and Kurhan face up to six years in jail, if found guilty.
5. "A bold message, lost on Turkey", Armenia Armenia should be rejoicing at the passage of a bill last week by France's National Assembly that would make it a crime to deny the genocide of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century.
6. "Kurds Recount Atrocities Under Saddam", Kurdish witnesses described poison gas attacks, airstrikes and prison abuse at Saddam Hussein's genocide trial Thursday, a day after Iraq's prime minister said the ousted leader's execution would defuse the insurgency.
1. - EUTCC - "Third International Conference on the EU, Turkey and the Kurds":
16th-17th October 2006, European Parliament, Brussels
Organised by the EU-Turkey Civic Commission (EUTCC) and the GUE/NGL Group in the European Parliament
INTRODUCTION TO FINAL RESOLUTIONS
The Third International Conference on the EU, Turkey and the Kurds brings together human rights defenders, writers, academics, lawyers and experts on the Kurdish Question to exchange ideas and generate dialogue on the Kurdish issue and the Turkey-EU accession process. The conference was held at the European Parliament in Brussels and supported by members of the European Parliament.
A fundamental aim of the Conference Resolution is to help to guarantee respect for human and minority rights and to promote a peaceful, democratic and long-term solution to the Kurdish situation as well as the accession of Turkey as a member of the EU. To this end, the Conference hereby resolves to monitor and conduct regular audits of Turkey’s compliance with its regional human rights obligations and other EU related accession criteria. The Conference further resolves to periodically make recommendations of measures that could advance the protection of the human rights of the Kurds and to act as a point of contact and exchange of information with the Turkish and European Governments, EU institutions and other governmental and non-governmental organisations involved in the Turkish EU accession process and the peaceful resolution of the Kurdish issue in Turkey.
FINAL RESOLUTIONS
Pursuant to the presentation of Conference papers and interventions made by delegates, this Conference unanimously resolves to adopt the following declarations and calls for action to be undertaken by relevant parties to the Kurdish conflict in Turkey.
The Conference issues the following declarations:
1) Recalling the resolutions from the First and Second International Conferences on Turkey, EU & The Kurds, the Third International Conference continues to give its qualified support to Turkey’s EU accession process;
2) The Third International Conference calls upon European Governments to publicly express support for the EU accession process, including support of all EU requirements concerning democratic and legal reform within Turkey;
3) The Conference hereby continues to acknowledge the Turkish Government’s progress on reform during 2002-4, but echoes the European Parliament Resolution of 27 September 2006 expressing regret at the ‘slowing down of the reform process’ which can be seen in the ‘persistent shortcomings or insufficient progress in particular in the areas of freedom of expression, religious and minority rights, civil-military relations, law enforcement on the ground, women’s rights, trade union rights, cultural rights and the swift and correct enforcement of court rulings by State services’ and joins with them in urging Turkey to ‘reinvigorate the reform process’;
4) The Conference notes with alarm the failure of certain State institutions to adhere to its obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights and humanitarian law in accordance with the spirit and terms of its own recent reform packages and commitments given under the accession process; in particular, it is dismayed that institutions of the State have continued its military activities;
5) The Conference welcomes the declaration of a ceasefire by the PKK on 1 October 2006 and hereby calls upon all relevant parties involved in the armed conflict in Turkey to forthwith stop all hostile military operations in the region and to henceforth pursue non-violent resolutions to the conflict;
6) In particular, the Conference calls upon all governments, to urge Turkey and other Member States of the EU to help foster a climate of peace so that a democratic platform for dialogue can be established between Turks, Kurds, and other constituent peoples and minorities who are resident in Turkey;
Human Rights and Accession
7) The Conference supports the undertakings by the EU that reform in the area of fundamental rights, democracy and the rule of law must be strengthened in the course of accession negotiations and welcomes the commitment by the EU Commission to continue to monitor the reform process; this should include a complete overhaul of the justice system including how judges are recruited and chosen;
8) The Conference reiterates the view expressed in the First and Second Conferences that Turkey has not yet fulfilled the political elements of the Copenhagen Criteria, and reiterates that its support for the accession process is dependent upon the institutions of the EU robustly enforcing accession standards. It further underlines that there can be no further compromises on membership criteria akin to the EU decision to allow Turkey access to the negotiating table for ‘sufficiently’ fulfilling the Copenhagen Criteria;
9) The Conference specifically calls upon both the Turkish Government and the EU to ensure that Turkey fully complies with its human rights obligations in relation to torture and ill treatment, the plight of internally displaced people, protection of women and children, minority rights, and freedoms of expression, association, language and religion;
10) The Conference also calls upon Turkey to ratify the European Framework Convention on the Protection of Minorities as well as other UN Instruments concerning minorities and to respect the existing cultural and minority rights of all groups;
11) In reference to the above resolution, the Conference also calls on the EU to apply pressure on the Government of Turkey as a potential member of the EU to ratify said Framework;
12) Recalling Articles 10, and 14, and Article 2 of the first Protocol of the European Convention on Human Rights and Article 8 of the European Charter for Regional or Minority languages, and the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly’s resolution 1519 of October 2006 on the cultural situation of the Kurds, the Conference calls upon the State of Turkey and the European Union to develop and promote a strategic plan for mother tongue education;
13) With specific reference to the reports of the European Parliament in September 2006, the European Commission of November 2005, the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women’s report in July 2006 and the concerns expressed in the 2005 CEDAW response to Turkish Report to the Committee, the conference calls on EU to ensure that Turkey addresses the Status of all of its women and girls, and particularly its Kurdish women and girls in the context of international standards;
14) This Conference expresses regret the Turkish government’s initiation of work on the ill-planned Ilisu Dam in August 2006 which threatens mass displacement and loss of livelihood of the area’s inhabitants, the majority of whom are Kurds; endangers the historically important city of Hasankeyf, in an apparent attempt to further disassociate Kurds from their rich heritage and culture; and will, according to several environmental assessment reports, jeopardize access to water for Turkey’s neighbours and cause irreversible environmental harm;
15) In reference to the above, the Conference calls upon the Turkish government to reassess its position vis-à-vis this project, as well as the bodies of the EU monitoring the impact of internal displacement and what the potential effects of this project are on the already overpopulated urban centres of the Kurdish regions;
The Centrality of the Kurdish Question
16) The Conference asserts that the resolution of the Kurdish conflict is essential to the establishment of a stable, democratic and peaceful Turkey capable of entering the European Union. True democratic reform can only occur if Turkey undertakes new political reform to its state institutions and banishes adherence to ethnic nationalism which is the root cause of the conflict and Turkey’s endemic instability;
17) This Conference therefore asserts that the Kurdish people and their representatives should be given a genuine participatory role in the accession process and in any debate over Turkey’s democratic constitutional future;
18) However, the Conference further asserts that more must and can be done on both sides and calls for the following confidence building measures to be adopted;
Confidence Building Measures
19) In particular, the Conference calls upon all political parties in Turkey to help foster the conditions within Turkey for a democratic platform for dialogue;
20) Based on the present ceasefire holding, the Conference calls upon the European Commission and Council to endeavour to actively develop a democratic platform whereby the constituent elements of Turkey, including the Kurdish people and their representatives, can freely enter into dialogue and debate with the Government over possible reform to the Constitution;
21) In this respect the Conference recalls the following declaration in the European Commission’s 1998 report that:
‘A civil and non-military solution must be found to the situation in the Southeast Turkey particularly since many of the violations of civil and political rights observed in the country are connected in one way or another with this issue’;
22) The Conference further recalls that the EU Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs in December 2004 urged: ‘all parties involved to put an immediate end to the hostilities in the Southeast of the country” and invited “the Turkish Government to take more active steps to bring reconciliation with those Kurdish forces who have chosen to abandon the use of arms.’
23) The Conference recognises the potential contribution to peace presented by the three newly appointed co-ordinators representing Iraq, Turkey and US, and calls on them to work together to find ways forward with the issue of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). The EUTCC calls upon these representatives and all other relevant regional and national stakeholders and policy-makers to pursue a democratic solution through dialogue;
24) The Conference also calls upon the Turkish Government to fully and unconditionally comply with all international instruments concerning human and minority rights guaranteed by the European Convention of Human Rights, in particular, the rights concerning freedom of expression and association without discrimination, in order to ensure that such a democratic debate can take place;
25) In particular, the Conference calls upon the Turkish Government to ensure that all legally constituted Kurdish democratic parties are allowed to engage in peaceful political activity without interference or constant threat of closure, in accordance with Articles 10 and 11 of the European Convention of Human Rights;
26) The Conference further calls upon the Turkish Government to fully comply with all judgments of the European Court of Human Rights particularly in relation to those that pertain to the Kurdish conflict. The conference notes the European Commissions Reports’ particular citation of the ECHR case of Abdullah Öcalan v Turkey in this regard;
27) In this respect, the Conference calls upon the Turkish Government to begin a public debate about the constitutional recognition of the existence of the Kurdish people within Turkey;
28) The Conference also urges all member states of the European Union to individually assist —including earmarking funds— in the creation of a democratic platform for dialogue between Turkey and the Kurds and fully comply with their own freedom of expression obligations in respect of those Kurdish organisations and individuals who are concerned to promote the same;
29) The Conference endorses the recent recommendations of the Council of Europe’s representative regarding the creation of a Committee for Reconciliation;
30) The Conference also urges Governments of the EU not to criminalise peaceful dissent of Turkey echoed by Kurdish organisations situated in Europe and to review its recent proscription of certain Kurdish organisations, especially in the light of recent ceasefire declarations and public commitments to the search for a peaceful solution of the Kurdish question within the present territorial integrity of a democratically reformed Turkey;
31) Finally, the Conference mandates, its Directors, Advisors
and Committees, to engage and campaign on both a political and civic
level across Europe in support of Turkey’s accession bid to join
the European Union on the basis of this resolution. 
2. - Socialist Worker Online - "Orhan Pamuk’s Nobel Prize throws Turkish nationalists online only":
ISTANBUL / 19 October 2006 / by Ron Margulies
We may have our own views about Orhan Pamuk’s novels, but there can be no doubt that Pamuk richly deserves the prize both in literary terms and as a man with deeply-held views which he is not afraid to express regardless of the consequences.
Watching the Turkish media and political world squirm and agonise has been as joyful and magnificent as the expression on Pamuk’s face must have been upon hearing the news.
The prize was announced on the very same day that the French parliament voted to make it a criminal offence to deny the Armenian holocaust. In 1915, the dying Ottoman Empire drove its Armenian citizens into a forced migration, which caused one million or more to perish.
Turkish governments have always denied that there was a systematic attempt at ethnic cleansing, that so many Armenians died and that this was a holocaust. They admit to a figure of 300,000, claim that there was killing on both sides and that the whole incident was an unfortunate but unavoidable sideshow of the First World War.
Pamuk, whose every novel is a literary event and sells hundreds of thousands in Turkey, was prosecuted last year for simply saying to a German journalist that a million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds had been killed in Turkey. He was neither the first nor the last writer to be prosecuted under Law 301 which makes it a crime to “insult Turkishness”, but he was the most prominent internationally. Like most of those prosecuted under 301, he was acquitted. But he also became a figure of hate for the right and most of the media.
Normally, a Turk winning an international prize (like a Turkish team winning a football game abroad) would be cause for jubilation and nationalistic frenzy. In this case, however, the right didn’t know what to do! On the extreme right, the response was “Pamuk is a traitor, he sold his country, and this is his reward”.
The more common response, expressed in one particular newspaper headline, was “I don’t know whether to be glad or sad”.
Even those who praised Pamuk and agreed that he deserved the prize for his novels couldn’t stop themselves from saying that he may not have been given it if he hadn’t spoken out about the Armenians. Prime Minister Erdogan telephoned Pamuk to congratulate him, but President Sezer pointedly did not do so.
But most amusing of all was the sight of politicians and journalists who have never said a word about any of the many anti-democratic laws in Turkey rage about the anti-democratic vote in the French parliament. Having never worried about Law 301 here, they suddenly became very concerned about the democratic rights of any French citizen who wishes to say that there was no Armenian holocaust.
In ten years time nobody will remember any of these people.
Unlike Pamuk, who has already taken his place in world literary history.
3. - Kurdish Media - "Kurdish linguistic rights report, 2006":
19 October 2006 / by Dr Zorab Aloian
Submitted to the Translation and Linguistic Rights Committee of the International PEN at the Ohrid Conference, Republic of Macedonia, 14th-17th September, 2006
The historical and geographic area where the Kurds and their language came into existence and where they nowadays constitute an overwhelming majority has been referred to as Kurdistan. This name is officially recognised by the Iraqi Constitution as a federal part of the state and in Iran as a province (ostan). Turkey and Syria, the two other states controlling parts of the Kurdish homeland deny its existence. These four countries share the responsibility for the status of the Kurdish language and identity.
Iraq
Iraq appears to be the most positive case for the well-being of the Kurdish language and literature. It must be however pointed out that it was due to the struggle of the Kurdistan liberation movement and immense suffering inflicted on the Kurds throughout the twentieth century that enabled the federative structure for Kurdistan. The credit must not be given to the central authorities in Baghdad, although there have been Iraqi Arab intellectuals sympathising with the Kurdish identity.
According to the new Iraqi Constitution adopted by the referendum in 2005 there are two official languages in Iraq: Arabic and Kurdish. Both languages shall be taught throughout Iraq and used in various spheres of the state system. It is assumed that Arabic is the first language in Arab parts of Iraq whereas Kurdish is the primary language in the federal region of Kurdistan. Official documentations, laws and parliament sessions are to be functioning in both languages. The court system and education is mostly in Kurdish in Kurdistan and in Arabic in the Arab provinces of Iraq. There are six major articles in the Iraqi Constitution that regulate the status of these language.
The Iraqi Constitution and the draft Constitution of Iraqi Kurdistan make special provisions for the minority languages. These languages – Syriac (the mother tongue of many Assyrian and Chaldean Christians), Turkoman and Armenian – enjoy a particular high status in Kurdistan. The matter is that the Kurds have a strong tradition of hospitality and that their dream of independence lasted so long that they would not risk their achievements by acting irresponsibly.
In practical terms, there are thousands of schools and four universities in Iraqi Kurdistan with Kurdish as the language of education. Kurdish is the chief mass media language in TV and radio broadcastings, about 300 periodicals and three major publishing centres. There are journals in Kurdish for youth, sport, women and religious minorities (Yezidi, Shabak, Kakayi and Christians). The journal ‘Serdem’ in a major Kurdistan city of Sulaymaniya for instance is dedicated to literary translations into Kurdish. Some other literary periodicals have specific target audience: ‘Nûbûn’ (in the capital city of Erbil, by the Ministry of Culture), ‘Peyv’ (in the city of Duhok, by the Union of Kurdistan Writers), ‘Sivore’ and ‘Heng’ (both for children), ‘Basara’ and ‘Baba Gurrgur’ (both in the city of Kerkuk) and many others.
Iran
The Kurds are the third largest ethnic group in Iran, after the Persians and the Turkish-speaking Azeri Shiites. The Kurds belong to the same linguistic family with the Persian majority and the Beludji, Gilak, Talish and some other minority groups.
Legally speaking, the article 15 of the Iranian Constitution provides the possibility for the mother tongue education for all peoples of Iran, including the Azeris, Arabs, Baludjis and Kurds. They are entitled to open schools and educate children in their languages alongside Persian, the official language in Iran. However, since 20 years there have been no single school initiated in Iran in Kurdish. It has obviously a political dimension since the Kurds are the leading opponents of the Islamic regime. Kurdish has shortly gained a major status during the short-lived Kurdistan Republic of Mehabad in 1945-1946, during which the local administration and education have been in Kurdish. Afterwards, there have been attempts – mostly private ones – in Mehabad and other cities to open schools and teach Kurdish. There are state-controlled Kurdish periodicals, broadcasting, student and cultural organisations in Iran. Nevertheless, there are no formal classes in schools and no formal recognition of Kurdish in the provinces with the Kurdish majority. There are also reports of a new pressure against Kurdish children’s names and Kurdish titles given to shops and private structures.
Turkey
The Copenhagen Criteria of 1993 established high standards for the candidate states to the European Union. One of the three main blocks refers to the political criteria aimed at guaranteeing democratic stability and human rights of minorities. Today, after years of controversial discussions, political and legal changes in Turkey, there are no legal references to the Kurdish language and people in the state constitution or any other law. Even some steps in the right direction are legally framed for ‘minority languages and dialects’. Kurdish may not be used for public purposes such as election campaigns and in government bodies.
It must be however noted that the current Islamic AKP party-led government made attempts to manage the Kurdish issue. Apparently, the most important symbolic act was the first half-an-hour Kurdish, Bosnian, Circassian and Arabic TV news programmes on the state TRT station. Thus, the 9th of June, 2004, might have become a new opening in the relationships between the Turkish state and the Kurds. However, an inability to build upon this event was criticized even by the daily Millliyet that on the same day claimed that ‘the EU won’t swallow it’. The reason is that these TV programmes are not allowed to educate the Kurds about their language, history and culture and forbid them to criticise the state. Another significant element for the TV programmes as well as for the private Kurdish language courses was the prohibition to teach Kurdish to children.
The year of 2006 may be described as a stagnation of the EU process in Turkey in general and bleak perspectives for the Kurdish cultural and political rights in particular. The two recent examples prove this setback.
In May, 2006, political prisoners in Burdur, Sivas und Buca (Izmir) protested the banning of their phone conversation in Kurdish with their relatives.
Besides, the Swedish news agency TT reported on the 25th of August, 2006, the Turkish authorities in Istanbul have seized 1,208 Kurdish versions of the books about Pippi Longstocking, the world-famous fictional children's character. They were sent on the 7th of August from Sweden by an organization that runs an education project for Kurds. The books had been set for delivery to libraries in five Kurdish villages. As it is well known, Astrid Lindgren's books about Pippi Longstocking have been translated into 85 languages and published in more than 100 countries.
The sad irony is that whilst Turkey demands linguistic education and cultural rights for the Turks in the neighbouring countries and Turkish migrants to Europe, it has not assured equivalent rights for Kurdish children in their homeland. Not surprisingly, on the 7th of July, 2006, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) appealed on Turkey to allow Kurdish classes for children. According to the UNISEF, the examples of the education in vernacular languages world-wide prove higher schooling results.
Syria
Syria is attested as the country with absence of political liberties and gross violations of human rights. The drastic oppression against the Kurds includes an overall prohibition of Kurdish identity. In this sense, Syria may be defined as the worst case. The reality in Syria implies that against the background of 12 % of the Kurds within the whole Syrian population and more than 90 % in three Kurdish provinces in the north, there are no legal mentioning of their language, no state or private schooling in Kurdish and no place for use of Kurdish in the central or local government bodies.
During the French occupation and the years before the Baas party usurped the power in Syria, there has been a lovely cultural life amongst the Kurds. The best-known poets, writers and the person who standardised the northern Kurdish dialect of Kurmanji Mir Djeladet Badirkhan lived and worked there. Currently, the ‘samizdat’-type illegal Kurdish periodicals are mostly attached to political parties: ‘Gulistan’, ‘Gelawêj’, ‘Stêr’, ‘Roj’, ‘Pirs, ‘Xunav’, ‘Buhar’, ‘Jîn’ and ‘Rojda’. Some journals have been truly cultural and independent including ‘Zanîn’, ‘Gurzek Gul’, ‘Zevî’, ‘Hogir’, ‘Gulîzara Zarokan’ (for children), ‘Aso’ and ‘Xwendevan’. The intellectual resistance against the state terror has been demonstrated in such Kurdish newspapers as ‘Newroz’, ‘Deng’ and ‘Delav’. Many Kurdish activists have been imprisoned or disappeared while writing in or distributing them.
Conclusion
In knowledge societies uniformity is a handicap. Creativity, new ideas and multilingualism are the prerequisite for humankind to adapt to change. As it has been demonstrated by Dr. Tove Skutnabb-Kangas during the 20-25 March, 2005, Diyarbakir Seminar on the Cultural Diversity, “dominant-language-only submersion programmes are widely attested as the least effective educationally for minority language students”. This is the model Turkey is using for Kurdish children. Dr. Skutnabb-Kangas concedes that it may sound hard, but in Turkey (one may also add Syria and to a lesser extent Iran), Kurds are subjected to linguistic genocide. To make a valid argumentation, she quotes the relevant UN Convention. The United Nations International Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (E793, 1948) has five definitions of genocide. Two of them fit her remark:
Article II(e): “forcibly transferring children of the group to another group” and
Article II(b): “causing serious bodily or mental
harm to members of the group”.
The aspiration to pacify the region, where tens of millions of the Kurds
live, may be derived from the Iraqi Kurdistan example. The Kurdish PEN
Centre together with the Ministry of Culture of Kurdistan Federal Region
proposes a conference on the topic and hopes to obtain the CTRL blessing.
* Dr Zorab Aloian is the secretary of the Kurdish PEN
Centre and a regular KurdishMedia.com writer.
4. - Bianet - "Chomsky's Publishers On Trial":
Publishers of the translation of Chomsky's "Role of Mass Media: Manufacturing of Consent" tell court it shouldn't be them facing the bench. Publisher Tas, translator Abadoglu, editor Tosun and Kurhan face up to six years in jail, if found guilty.
ISTANBUL / 19 October 2006 / by Erol Onderoglu
Four people have been charged this week for involvement in the publishing of a Turkish language translation of American linguist and philosopher Noam Chomsky 's "Role of Mass Media: Manufacturing of Consent" facing 1.5 to 6 years imprisonment if found guilty.
Aram Publishing House executive Fatih Tas, the book's translator Ender Abadoglu, editor Lutfi Taylan Tosun and Omer Faruk Kurhan, one of the redactors of the book, turned up for the first hearing of the case at the Istanbul 2nd Criminal Court of First Instance flanked by their lawyers on Wednesday.
All suspects are accused under articles 216 and 301 of the Turkish Penal Code for "publicly denigrating Turkishness, the Republic and the Parliament" and "inciting hatred and enmity among the people".
The first trial saw presiding judge Sevim Efendiler agreeing with public prosecutor Kadir Nazmi Yelkenci's opinion and rejecting attorney Ozcan Kilic's request for the case file to be postponed as "criminal liability" outlined in article 11/4 of the Press Law was contrary to the Constitution and the European Convention on Human Rights.
Addressing the court at the start of the hearing, translator Abadoglu explained, "The opinions in the book are opinions of the author. I believe the translator cannot be held responsible for these opinions".
Abadoglu referred to the recent ordeal of the Armenian genocide bill in the French Parliament and said that although opinions in favor of an Armenian genocide having taken place were translated into Turkish press reports non of the translators had been prosecuted.
"It is wrong to put publishers and translators on trial"
In his statement to the court, Tosun said his function was that of ensuring the book was properly translated from its original and expressed in good Turkish.
"As far as I checked it," he said, "there was no problem in the translation". Tosun added "I did not see any factors of offence in the work".
Publisher Tas said he saw it inappropriate that he and the translators were being put on trial for a book whose author was will arrive and defended that the book itself was an analysis of the media with ih international importance.
The last defendant to address the court was Kurhan who said he had noticed no statement in the book that could be charged under article 216 on "inciting hated and enmity" and argued that the very sole of controversial article 301 served to protect the immunity of the state and was open to interpretations and mistakes.
After the defendants made their statements, attorney Inan Yilmaz referred to author Noam Chomsky saying "If we are putting an author, linguist and a professor of philosophy with international importance on trial, we should give these individuals the right to defend themselves in the courts of the land".
"My client before you has translated the work of this writer who we cannot pt on trial. Unfortunately with such cases we are living in the shadows" he said.
Defendants to give written defense
Stressing that none of the four suspects on trial were being charged for their own opinions, attorney Ugur Demirci denied the allegations and informed the court it would be receiving a written defense.
Of the defense lawyers, Ozcan Kilic said the book targeted the United States and added "US operations, massacres and coups throughout the world are being explained. The way these reflect in the media are being revealed. In this context it is a strange situation that four people are on trial under articles 216 and 301".
Having heard the initial defense arguments, judge Efendiler agreed to give time for written statements to be prepared and adjourned the court to December 20.
John Tirman's case continues
This week's case against Aram Publishing House comes in the footsteps of another trial involving a Turkish translation of an American author's work.
In September, the same court heard charges against translators Lutfi Taylan Tosun and Aysel Yildirim alongside Aram Publishing House owner Fatih Tas for the Turkish language copy of John Tirman's book "Spoils of War: The Human Cost of America's Arms Trade".
If found guilty on the charges of "publicly denigrating the armed forces" and "insulting [modern Turkey's founder] Ataturk" through content originally written by Tirman himself, each of those defendants face up to 6.5 years imprisonment.
Both translators in Tirman's book case also rejected the accusations while Tas's attorney Ozcan Kilic rejected the trial of the publisher on grounds that the author of the work was known and there was no reason to put a publisher on trial just because the author lived abroad.
The investigation into the Turkish language copy of "Spoils of War: The Human Cost of America's Arms Trade" started in November 2005. It covers various excerpts in Tirman's work that focuses on criticism of US policy in the Middle East - arguing that dollars earned through the arms trade led to support of militarization in the region while holding back essential democratic reforms.
Subject to the Istanbul charges are sections of the book relating to severe human rights violations allegedly committed by security forces in the 1990s inclusive of claims of "white genocide", assimilation, censorship and denial of cultural rights.
The Tirman case will continue in Istanbul on November
29.
5. - International Herald Tribune - "A bold message, lost on Turkey":
YEREVAN / 19 October 2006 / by Vartan Oskanian*
Armenia Armenia should be rejoicing at the passage of
a bill last week by France's National Assembly that would make it a
crime to deny the genocide of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire in the
early 20th century.
The message from France is clear: So long as Turkey refuses to confront
its own history, others will feel impelled to do so. If, on the other
hand, Turkey embarks on the difficult road of acknowledgement and reconciliation,
then others will have reason to step aside and let the process take
its course.
Instead, we note with dismay that this very strong message is being
lost on Turkey. It continues to surround itself with myths, evade the
past, and thus elude the future.
As we observe the reactions in Turkey, we find it disingenuous for a
country that itself doesn't allow free speech and criminalizes even
the exploration of certain areas of its own (and therefore our) history
to be so indignant over a law that criminalizes the rejection and denial
of that same history.
After all, the actual, difficult discourse must evolve in Turkey, and
not in France, or Switzerland. It is in Turkey that a free and open
dialogue is deeply needed, and sorely absent. Those who cry "leave
history to the historians" have gagged the historians.
At the same time, Turkey objects vehemently to the involvement of third
countries in a discussion that really must take place between Turks
and Armenians.
No one wants such a dialogue more than Armenia. Yet Turkey has made
such give-and-take between our peoples and our states impossible. In
addition to the restrictions on speech, our borders remain closed. Nor
are there diplomatic relations between our countries.
In other words, there are no opportunities for new experiences, new
memories, new interactions to build up alongside the old. Instead, there
is a lingering security concern about a neighbor that has not repudiated
such state violence.
As Turkey continues to corner itself, it handicaps the future of this
region and impacts the lives of its people and ours. Worse, those extremists
who understand the great risks and costs of tolerance, openness and
rapprochement, are emboldened.
We are not the only neighbors in the world who have a troubled relationship.
Yet it is exactly because we live right next door that we must be willing
and prepared to transcend the past.
France's principled acknowledgement of the 20th century's first genocide
offers the hundreds of thousands of French Armenians, all descended
from genocide survivors, the dignity that they have been denied because
of the Turkish government's continuing insistence that the atrocities
they lived through are unproven myths.
There is no doubt that if the word "genocide" had existed
in 1915, every one of the hundreds of articles in newspapers around
the world would have used it. Look how frequently the word is used today
to describe events and cases where the scale and depth of the carnage
are even smaller.
When a government plans to do away with its own population to solve
a political problem, that's genocide. The U.S. ambassador to Turkey
from 1913 to 1916, Henry Morgenthau Sr., called what he witnessed the
"Murder of a Nation." Others called it "race murder."
They did so because the term genocide did not exist yet.
Those who deposed the Ottoman rulers - the early leaders of modern Turkey,
including Kemal Ataturk - actually court-martialed those who instigated
these crimes. Today's Republic of Turkey, which has inherited the nationalism
of its founders but not their memory, spends untold amounts to convince
the world they didn't happen.
Not just money. Today, their continued insistence on rejecting and rewriting
history costs them credibility and time. Today's Turks do not bear the
guilt of the perpetrators, unless they choose to defend and identify
with them.
It is a political reality that both Turkey and Armenia exist today in
the international community with their current borders. It is a political
reality that we are neighbors. It is a political reality that Armenia
is not a security threat to Turkey. Finally, it is a reality that today's
Armenia calls for the establishment of diplomatic relations with today's
Turkey.
Armenia has no preconditions for establishing diplomatic relations.
Nor is Armenia opposed to Turkey's membership in the EU. We'd like to
see Turkey meet all European standards. We'd like to see Turkey become
an EU member so that our borders will be open and we can cooperate to
build a secure, prosperous region.
We can only assume that Europe will expect that a Turkey which is serious
about EU membership will come to terms with its past. A few in Turkish
society have begun that difficult process of introspection and study.
We can only welcome this process.
It is essential that the international community does not bend the rules,
does not turn a blind eye, does not lower its standards, but instead
consistently extends its hand, its example, its own history of transcending,
in order for Armenians and Turks, Europeans all, to move on to making
new history.
* Vartan Oskanian is the minister of foreign affairs of Armenia.
6. - AP - "Kurds Recount Atrocities Under Saddam":
BAGHDAD / 19 October 2006 / by Bushra Juhi and Jamal Halaby
Kurdish witnesses described poison gas attacks, airstrikes and prison abuse at Saddam Hussein's genocide trial Thursday, a day after Iraq's prime minister said the ousted leader's execution would defuse the insurgency.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's remarks revealed his government's frustration in efforts to quell attacks by Sunni Arabs, some of whom are believed to be affiliated with Saddam's disbanded Baath Party.
After meeting two top Shiite clerics Wednesday in Najaf, al-Maliki said he hoped Saddam's Kurdish genocide trial, which began Aug. 21, would end quickly and that ``a death sentence will be passed against this criminal tyrant, his aides and the criminals who worked with him.''
``Definitely, with his execution, those betting on returning to power under the banner of Saddam and the Baath (Party) will lose,'' al-Maliki told reporters.
Saddam's supporters have said his trials are unfair and accused the new Iraqi government of interfering in the judicial process - charges Iraq's leaders deny.
The former Iraqi leader and six co-defendants were on trial for their roles in Operation Anfal, a military offensive against the Kurds in 1987-88. Prosecutors say some 180,000 Kurds were killed and hundreds of villages destroyed.
Saddam and another defendant are charged with genocide, but all seven could face the death penalty if convicted.
The ex-president also faces death by hanging in his first trial, in connection with the deaths of some 148 Shiite villagers in Dujail after an assassination attempt in 1982. A verdict in that trial is expected next month.
In court Thursday, two Kurdish witnesses testified that villagers fled in panic after a chemical weapons attack on northern Iraq in 1988. Some took refuge in the mountains where Iraqi air force planes bombed them, they said.
The trial then adjourned until Oct. 30.
``People in my village were screaming that they were contaminated by chemical weapons,'' 79-year-old Abdullah Saeed said, recalling how clouds of smoke drifted toward his home after Saddam's forces allegedly bombed two villages in April 1988.
``We loaded children, women and other persons infected with chemical weapons onto three trucks and fled to another village,'' he said in Kurdish, through an Arabic interpreter.
Saeed said Saddam's forces stopped them along the road and took them to a detention facility, where 1,800 people - out of some 7,000 Kurds imprisoned there - allegedly died of malnutrition. He said the figure was based on a document stolen from prison records.
At the prison, a warden called Hajjaj - whom previous witnesses accused of raping and torturing detainees - denied prisoners water to drink, Saeed said. ``He told us: `We cut the water so that you'd die. You came here to die.'''
He said prison guards also humiliated female prisoners.
``I saw one pregnant woman giving birth on the ground in front of the guards, who didn't help her,'' Saeed said. He added that eight of his relatives have disappeared since Saddam's offensive 18 years ago.
``I demand compensation for the loss of my eight family members,'' he said, presenting documents with his relatives' identities.
Another witness from a neighboring village said Iraqi warplanes bombed villagers as they tried to escape.
``My nephew and another man got killed, and we left their
bodies lying in the mountains,'' Bakir Qader Mohammad, 72, testified.
He said he ended up in the same detention facility, where sanitary conditions
were so poor that inmates contracted cholera.