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Today's Zaman, Turkey
Dec 31 2008
Ä°zmir court hands down 4 years to assailant of priest
An Ä°zmir court has sentenced a 19-year-old man to four years in
prison for stabbing a Roman Catholic priest last year in western
Turkey.
The court sentenced defendant Ramazan Bay on Monday and fined him for
carrying the switchblade knife used in the attack. Bay stabbed the
65-year-old Italian priest in December 2007 after a mass at a church
in Ä°zmir and surrendered shortly after the attack. The priest
survived.
Turkey's small Christian community has been targeted in recent years
in several attacks, including one last year in which three Christians
-- two of them Turkish converts -- were killed in the central city of
Malatya. Another Italian Catholic priest was shot and killed in 2006
in Trabzon. In addition, Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was
slain last year in Ä°stanbul by a nationalist gunman.
31 December 2008, Wednesday
TODAY'S ZAMAN WITH WIRES Ä°STANBUL
Dec 31 2008
Ä°zmir court hands down 4 years to assailant of priest
An Ä°zmir court has sentenced a 19-year-old man to four years in
prison for stabbing a Roman Catholic priest last year in western
Turkey.
The court sentenced defendant Ramazan Bay on Monday and fined him for
carrying the switchblade knife used in the attack. Bay stabbed the
65-year-old Italian priest in December 2007 after a mass at a church
in Ä°zmir and surrendered shortly after the attack. The priest
survived.
Turkey's small Christian community has been targeted in recent years
in several attacks, including one last year in which three Christians
-- two of them Turkish converts -- were killed in the central city of
Malatya. Another Italian Catholic priest was shot and killed in 2006
in Trabzon. In addition, Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was
slain last year in Ä°stanbul by a nationalist gunman.
31 December 2008, Wednesday
TODAY'S ZAMAN WITH WIRES Ä°STANBUL