Epress.am News from Armenia
The case of the murder of Turkish-Armenian journalist, editor of bilingual weekly Agos Hrant Dink resumed on Feb. 7 in Istanbul. To mark the occasion, a group called Friends of Hrant Dink issued a statement in which they call on Turkey’s authorities to ensure a fair trial.
The statement, reprinted in full, is as follows:
“About three weeks ago, we commemorated our friend Hrant for the fourth time at the spot where he was shot. The conscience of this country, which was crushed under the military boots and torn apart in the torture centers, cried out with us. We said, ‘You cannot survive without justice.’ We said, ‘You cannot carry the burden of this crime of conscience.’ We said, ‘The owner of this murder is the state now, you cannot escape from yourself.’
“It appears that they insist on ignoring our calls. Hrant Dink’s murder is not being properly investigated even after four years. The murder trial is an ongoing vaudeville, in which there is no attempt on touching to the real perpetrators of the murder. Everyone still works in earnest to prevent the officials, who paved the way of Hrant’s assasination, who aided the murder, turned a blind eye, tried to turn the murderer into a hero, tampered evidence, prepared false reports, who did not provide the court with sufficient information, from being investigated and prosecuted. The most earnest of them all is the judiciary. The judicial system had not felt any uneasiness while convicting Hrant for something he hadn’t said, but it puts its heart and soul to protect the governors, heads of security, police officers and soldiers who had responsibility in his murder.
“The government has no will to act in ensuring the full truth be revealed, so the state would at least come partially clean. We do not know which faul and secret alliance prevents the government to act, but we consider that the government that took office with the votes of the people is part of the mechanism which hides and protects the real murderers.
“The decision of the European Court of Human Rights was clear. It not only found the Republic of Turkey responsible, it also said ‘your judges are racist.’ They all are still on duty. It said that the security forces were faulty. They all are still on duty.
“We are not here because we trust in this vaudeville rather than a murder trial. We are not here because we believed in the ones who announced that this murder is ‘an issue of honor.’
“We are here to demand from the government to implement the simple fundamentals of being a government. We are here to make sure that the judiciary would finally understand what ‘justice’ means. Why do the prosecutors and police exist, if they wouldn’t investigate such a murder? To execute for debt cases? Why do you have courts, if you wouldn’t use all the powers, authority and means of the state to prosecute the organization who murdered its citizen? For traffic offenses? You cannot call the mechanism whose only concern is to protect its officers while they commit the most serious crimes, a state.
“They are not aware that what had happened since the murder of Hrant make all of them illegitimate. Mabe they are aware, but do not care. Let them turn on their TVs and watch what has been going on in Egypt: on day, people make you care.
“Mahatma Gandhi has once said: First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.”