"Neither soldiers nor guerillas should die"

Osman Baydemir, the current mayor of Diyarbakir, has been sentenced to ten months in prison. The charge is that he was "expressing support and praise for terrorists".

What he said, was simply "Neither soldiers nor guerrillas should die".

The use of the word "guerrillas" instead of "terrorists" is against the law in Turkey.

"Neither soldiers nor guerrillas should die"

In what kind of country does the above sentence qualify a man for ten months in jail? Um, W.T.F.

The control of language, not just down to the word, but down to the letter is one of the main tools used by the Turkish State to maintain its denial of reality.

A quote from the Hurriyet story:

The court ruled that Osman Baydemir, mayor of Diyarbakir, the largest city in Turkey's predominantly Kurdish southeastern region, and Nejdet Atalay, mayor of nearby Batman, had praised terrorist PKK members by referring to them as "guerrillas."

The defendants made the remarks at a rally in Diyarbakir in February 2008, as Turkish security forces were carrying out cross-border operation into neighboring northern Iraq targeting hideouts of the PKK.

Lawyers for the defendants said they would appeal the sentences.

Baydemir had condemned the operation and called for a peaceful solution to the Kurdish issue, saying that "neither soldiers nor guerrillas should die."





In the same week: (Excerpt from Zaman)

a public prosecutor in Diyarbakir filed a case on Friday claiming that former Diyarbakir Bar Association Chairman Sezgin Tanrikulu had engaged in “discrimination” by publishing a bilingual agenda for members of the bar association. The prosecutor’s office also suggested that Tanrikulu misused his position as chairman of the bar association and “abused the linguistic feelings of the public,” calling for a three-year prison term as punishment. The deputy chairman of the bar association at the time, Nesip Yildirim, the other suspect in the case, did not participate in the crime, but openly supported it by collecting signatures for a petition titled “I am taking responsibility for my agenda and my bar association,” according to the prosecutor.
In 2007, when Tanrikulu was head of the Diyarbakir Bar Association, he ordered the publication of an agenda for the members of the association. The agenda featured dates in both Turkish and “a language that is used by a segment of the public,” meaning Kurdish in the words of the prosecutor’s report.

This means that publishing an agenda in a language that is used by a segment of the public amounts to discrimination.

“The publication of an agenda in an alphabet other than Turkish means discrimination in public services,” the prosecutor’s report claimed.

The public prosecutor also suggested that because the agenda was associated with the bar association, citizens whose “mother tongues are different” may hesitate to join the association or to ask for legal assistance. But the prosecutor’s report does not say openly what it means by citizens whose mother tongues are different.

The prosecutor argued that publishing an agenda in a language other than Turkish is an abuse of the “the linguistic feelings of the people” and that this was the basis of the case. Because bar associations are considered organizations that provide public services, the prosecutor had to get permission from the Ministry of Justice to proceed with the investigation and, according to the prosecutor’s report, the ministry gave its approval.

In his defense, Tanrikulu claimed that Kurdish is the mother tongue of Turkey’s Kurdish citizens and to use it is a legitimate right. Mentioning Tanrikulu’s defense, the prosecutor’s report responded: “The suspects in their defense suggested that the signs that are not in Turkish on the agenda under investigation belong to their mother tongue. However, Article 3 of the Turkish Constitution indicates that the language of the Turkish Republic is Turkish; Article 10 indicates that ‘all individuals are equal without any discrimination before the law and no privilege shall be granted to any individual, family, group or class’; and Article 11 states, ‘The provisions of the constitution are fundamental legal rules binding upon legislative, executive and judicial organs, and administrative authorities and other institutions and individuals’; and there are no international or national regulations for giving public services in mother tongues.”

At the court hearing on Friday, the present chairman of the Diyarbakir Bar Association, Mehmet Emin Aktar, presented incriminating information about himself and more than 100 lawyers who are members of the bar to the court and said, “If this is a crime, we committed the same crime.” Aktar also asked for time to prepare a defense. The next hearing in the case will be held on May 15.

The phrase that makes me laugh is "the publication of an alphabet other than Turkish"

No one ever has a cow if someone publishes something in French German, Spanish English, but if it's Kurdish it suddenly becomes this strange nameless "ALPHABET OTHER THAN TURKISH".

As if a language were a kind of kryptonite, so deadly, destructive, radio active, a kind of anti matter, so terrible it cannot even be named.

Imagine, someone can be sentenced to THREE YEARS IN JAIL for publishing A BILINGUAL AGENDA OF A MEETING.

That's our great Nato Ally.

Turkey: Where singing is a crime.

This trial was scheduled to happen today.



Three members of children's choir to be tried for singing in Kurdish

Three children, members of the Diyarbakir Yenisehir Council Children's Choir, will stand trial for singing a march in Kurdish while performing in the U.S. The indictment, dated 3 April 2008, seeks the imprisonment of three children under the age of 18 for up to five years each.

The choir attended the World Music Festival in San Francisco between 3 and 7 October 2007, and there sang a march in Kurdish: "Ey Raqip".

The Diyarbakir Public Prosecutor's office opened a case against three members of the choir: Servan Yilmaz, aged 16; Gökhan Ok, aged 17; and Veysel Mamuk, aged 16. The indictment argues that the children sang with Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) flags in the background, and that the song they sang has been adopted as an official march by the PKK. The indictment quoted the defence statements of the children, and said that the children took to the stage in San Fransisco and sang "Ey Raqip" after their teacher, Duygu Özge Bayar, taught them the song in one day because the audience requested it.

The children's lawyer, Baran Pamuk, noted that the song was written by the Iranian-Kurdish poet, Dildar, 68 years ago. Pamuk says: "That song was accepted as the national anthem of the Mahabad Kurdish Republic, which was proclaimed in 1946 and lasted for one year, and it is now used as an official anthem by the Northern Iraq Kurdish Federal Government. However, it is not possible to accept that a poem written 68 years ago is the propaganda tool of an organisation. The founders of the organisation in question were not even born yet at the time the poem was written. There is no mention of that organisation in the song."

The teacher of the choir, Duygu Bayar, stated: "We shared our culture there, at the festival. We sang various songs showing the styles of Diyarbakir. Churches and the Pir Sultan Abdal Cultural Association contributed to our repertory of songs. If performing these songs is separatism, then we are guilty of promoting separatism."

The children are charged with "making propaganda for a terrorist organisation" and will appear in court on 9 June 2008.

For further information: antenna@superonline.com, sanar@antenna-tr.org, Internet: http://www.antenna-tr.org


Another item from Info-Turk: This is one of the many freedom of expression cases from Turkey just this week.

Diyarbakır mayor Baydemir, Diyarbakır Council’s head of Administration of Accountancy Department Zülfi Atlı, Head of Culture and Tourism Department Mehmet Denli and former mayor of Sur, Abdullah Demirbaş were charged with “violating the law on the introduction and the use of Turkish Letters” and “misconduct in office” over a story book in Turkish and Kurdish. Diyarbakır Criminal Court of First Instance N°.15 set the next trial date as 16 July 2008, at 10:00. (antenna-tr.org, May 16, 2008)

I have to ask, what kind of absurdity is this? Why should anyone be forced to go to court over publishing "a story book". I have a copy of this book myself. It was published to encourage literacy. The stories are for children, in Turkish and Kurdish. In a city where 72 percent of the population speaks Kurdish, its common sense to publish a book in a language the children actually speak, as well as Turkish, the "official language".

If you published the same stories in Turkish and English, there would be no prosecution, even though the use of English violates all the same laws as the use of Kurdish. The law bans the use of letters that don't exist in the Turkish alphabet. W for instance. A highly suspect and divisive letter. Use it and go to jail. Or at least pay a huge fine and/or spend half your life defending yourself in court. Funny thing though, is that even the Turkish embassy uses the letter w : http://www.turkishembassy.org for instance. Why aren't they being forced into court for "violating the law on the introduction of and the use of Turkish letters"?

All the municipal offices in the Kurdish areas of Turkey are harrassed routinely by the "State" government in an attempt to render them non functional.

Mayors are frequently targeted for prosecution for things that would be considered the usual obligations of a Mayor, that is, serving the community he or she was elected too. In Izmir for example (and although this is not a "Kurdish area" it has a very high population of Kurds, a Mayor has been charged with misconduct for providing free water and other resources to his constituents. This is also from Info-Turk:

Dikili Mayor Is On Trial For Providing Free Water

Dikili mayor Osman Özgüven and 14 other members of the municipal council were at the 1st Court of First Instance of Dikili yesterday (June 3), facing the charges of “misconduct in office” or “abuse of power.”

The reason behind the accusations Osman Özgüven, the mayor of a small town in İzmir province in western Turkey, is facing are the services he provides for his town, foremost among them is the free water.

During his tenure Dikili Mayor Osman Özgüven from the Social Democrat People's Party (SHP) made public buses free, obliged bus drivers to drop students off at their homes, provided affordable health services at a municipal clinic, sold bread in municipal bakeries at low prices and did not charge households that use less than 10 tons of water a month.

In addition to the people of Dikili, representatives from many political parties and institutions were there to support the mayor.

Defending his position at the court, the mayor said that as one of the measures in helping prevent global warming, they did not charge people any water fee up to 10 tons and they charged the whole amount above this limit.

To encourage people, said Mayor Özgüven, they granted pardon for the interest payments of the water fees remained from the past administration. About municipality workers’ 50% water fee discount, he said “We wanted those people who are responsible for bringing water to the town to get their creation at lower prices. We did not violate the principle of equality.”

He also added that the municipalities were elected bodies and determination of the rates for their services was their job and that they simply exercised their right.

His lawyer Arif Ali Cangı said in his client’s defense that municipalities are not businesses.

“Municipality work is a public service. This case is trying the concept of public service.”

After Cangı the other members of the municipal council spoke. The defense lawyers demanded an investigation to determine whether or not the services rendered by Dikili Municipality were municipality services. The court is adjourned for the testimonies of the other members of the municipal court and the completion of the missing parts.

Outside the courthouse, Dikili mayor Osman Özgüven said that their services were going to continue, indicating that municipalities were not businesses, they have been serving the people of Dikili and will continue serving. (BIA, June 5, 2008)


Even more absurd is that the State government spies on its local government officials. Phones are taped, email correspondence and mail is intercepted. Local government officials are the no the only targets though. Again, from Info-turk:
I am being listened, you are being listened, he is listening…

It has been revealed that the Security General Directory has been following all phone, sms, e-mail and Internet communications of 70 million people through a decision of Ankara High Criminal Court Num. 11 which they renewed every three months. Security General Directory stated that they did not “listen” but “watched” by a three month court decision. Under the order of Ankara High Criminal Court Num.11 Security Intelligence Department receives all records of all phone and Internet correspondence in Turkey.

Special court decision needed for "Listening" but mass permission is enough for "watching."

As Vatan newspaper reported that police follows all phone conversations, sms, e-mails and fax messages; Security General Directory made the following statement:

"Just as what happens in all democratic countries, Turkish Police Force too naturally engages in all legal activities to prevent crime in the frame of its powers given by the laws and the Constitution. The referred court decision does not include listening. As known, individual court decisions are needed for each listening. Hence it can not be possible for us to listen the whole population in Turkey. Authorised units apply to courts in order to prevent terrorism and organised crime; if the courts grant permission than court decision is sent to Telecommunications Headquarters (TH). As reported in the newspaper the court granted the permission for the referred application. The court decision was sent to the TH and it was proceeded. Statue 5397 grants such power to related authorities in the fight against illegal organisations in order to prevent crime. We would like to inform the public that the referred court decision does not include “listening” and we believe that such reports distorting legal decisions in a way to misinform citizens should be corrected."

Under the order of Ankara High Criminal Court Num.11 Security Intelligence Department receives all detailed records of all phone and Internet correspondence in Turkey.