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Turkish Daily News, Turkey
Feb 1 2007
What Others Say
Thursday, February 1, 2007
The prosecutor's job is tough
Ýsmet BERKAN, Radikal
Indeed, one is left speechless on the controversy surrounding the
Hrant Dink Murder. The more I read about the connections involved in
the murder, the angrier I get, for, every piece of information I've
read until now clearly shows that this murder could have been
prevented. Imagine, a mole informed the police of the plot in full
detail at least one year before the assassination. The informer is
not an ordinary person. He is someone recruited - and perhaps even
paid - by the police for being close to ultra nationalist circles. So
he gives away the information, but what happens then? The police
literally ignore it. They don't monitor the activities of Yasin Hayal
[one of the key suspects in the Dink murder], they don't investigate
his connections and they don't even pay attention to the things
written on his favorite football club's Web site [messages praising
Hayal as `the bomber' were posted on the site]. As Radikal
journalists found out, an entire neighborhood actually knew that Dink
was going to be assassinated and that he was going to be killed by
Ogün Samast. They gathered in coffeehouses and openly talked about
killing Dink, passing around his pictures. They actually went to a
store to watch the news on TV together as a group.
What is the most mind-blowing of all here is that Hayal was never
taken seriously by the police, despite his documented predisposition
to violence. This is not all. Look, governors and police chiefs are
trying to protect those `nationalist' youths even after Dink's
murder. It is as if we are faced with a simple crime network formed
for a single action only to be dismantled afterwards. In reality that
is not the case. Nothing can be done unless it is commonly understood
and acknowledged that the murder was terrorism and the culprits are a
large organization with a serious ideological background.
Unfortunately, we have lost Hrant to a terrorist attack that could
have been prevented. Nevertheless, we still do not know how many more
`brothers' in Turkey there are. We do not know of their future plots
against their next victim. In order to find out, we need to monitor
closely the environments that spread hate directed at potential
victims and prevent the next crime through intelligence and regular
police investigation. Our police, although they want to prevent such
terrorist acts, do not have the ideological and legal background
needed for the struggle. This is why the task of Istanbul chief
prosecutors is so hard. If the crime is only killing Dink, then the
case is pretty much solved already. The prosecutors now need to
deepen the investigation and identify this new terrorist group and
register its name in court decisions. This is why the Dink murder
investigation is not, and cannot be, solely a murder investigation.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
Feb 1 2007
What Others Say
Thursday, February 1, 2007
The prosecutor's job is tough
Ýsmet BERKAN, Radikal
Indeed, one is left speechless on the controversy surrounding the
Hrant Dink Murder. The more I read about the connections involved in
the murder, the angrier I get, for, every piece of information I've
read until now clearly shows that this murder could have been
prevented. Imagine, a mole informed the police of the plot in full
detail at least one year before the assassination. The informer is
not an ordinary person. He is someone recruited - and perhaps even
paid - by the police for being close to ultra nationalist circles. So
he gives away the information, but what happens then? The police
literally ignore it. They don't monitor the activities of Yasin Hayal
[one of the key suspects in the Dink murder], they don't investigate
his connections and they don't even pay attention to the things
written on his favorite football club's Web site [messages praising
Hayal as `the bomber' were posted on the site]. As Radikal
journalists found out, an entire neighborhood actually knew that Dink
was going to be assassinated and that he was going to be killed by
Ogün Samast. They gathered in coffeehouses and openly talked about
killing Dink, passing around his pictures. They actually went to a
store to watch the news on TV together as a group.
What is the most mind-blowing of all here is that Hayal was never
taken seriously by the police, despite his documented predisposition
to violence. This is not all. Look, governors and police chiefs are
trying to protect those `nationalist' youths even after Dink's
murder. It is as if we are faced with a simple crime network formed
for a single action only to be dismantled afterwards. In reality that
is not the case. Nothing can be done unless it is commonly understood
and acknowledged that the murder was terrorism and the culprits are a
large organization with a serious ideological background.
Unfortunately, we have lost Hrant to a terrorist attack that could
have been prevented. Nevertheless, we still do not know how many more
`brothers' in Turkey there are. We do not know of their future plots
against their next victim. In order to find out, we need to monitor
closely the environments that spread hate directed at potential
victims and prevent the next crime through intelligence and regular
police investigation. Our police, although they want to prevent such
terrorist acts, do not have the ideological and legal background
needed for the struggle. This is why the task of Istanbul chief
prosecutors is so hard. If the crime is only killing Dink, then the
case is pretty much solved already. The prosecutors now need to
deepen the investigation and identify this new terrorist group and
register its name in court decisions. This is why the Dink murder
investigation is not, and cannot be, solely a murder investigation.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress