EU PROGESS REPORT ON JUSTICE

The European Council published its annual Progress Report for Turkey on 14 October. In the report's annotations on the judicial system, the Ergenekon Case, the Hrant Dink murder case and the murder of three Protestants in the Zirve publishing house in Malatya were given as examples of "high-profile cases [that] raised concerns about the quality of the investigations".

"Furthermore, there is a need to improve the working relationship between the police and the gendarmerie on the one hand and the judiciary on the other".

Dink cases should have been merged

As far as the Dink murder case is concerned, the report from the Prime Ministry Inspection Board issued in 2008 is explicitly mentioned, which "questioned the security forces role prior to the murder. According to the report, the security forces appeared to refrain from taking action after having received credible information about death threats against Mr. Dink. The trials in Istanbul, Samsun and Trabzon on this murder are continuing, but have not been merged, as has been requested by the lawyers representing the family of Mr. Dink".

RSF observing Dink trial

The international Reporters Without Borders (RSF) organization also criticized the handling of the Hrant Dink case in a statement after the trial's 11^th hearing on 12 October, saying that "basic questions [are] still unanswered".

"In hearing after hearing, the same fundamental questions remain, including the existence of a political will at the highest level to expose the truth in a case whose ramifications could turn it into a major government scandal. But one thing is now clearly established, namely the danger that the ultranationalist discourse and ideology of hate pose to Turkish society in its entirety. This danger has clearly not gone away."

The press freedom organisation added: "This is also evidenced by the fact that in the past four years, some 200 Turkish intellectuals, journalists, publishers and dissidents have been tried under criminal code article 301 on charges of humiliating Turkish identity or insulting state institutions, meaning the army, police and judicial system." (EÖ/VK)

Sources: Turkey 2009 Progress Report. Reporters Without Borders.