Ali Ünal, a columnist and lead writer for the shuttered Turkish daily Zaman, is serving a sentence of 19 years and 6 months after he was convicted in 2018 of “founding and leading an armed terrorist organization.”
Ünal was arrested shortly after the 2016 failed coup: police detained him at his house in the western province of Uşak on August 14, 2016, as part of a sweeping purge of suspected followers of exiled preacher Fethullah Gülen.
The government accused Gülen of maintaining a terrorist organization and “parallel state structure” (or FETÖ/PDY, as the government calls it) within Turkey that it blamed for orchestrating the military coup attempt on July 15, 2016.
A court in Istanbul arrested Ünal on August 16, 2016, on accusations of “being a member of an armed terrorist organization,” “aiding a (terrorist) organization,” and “making propaganda for a (terrorist) organization.”
In March 2023, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention released a report saying Ünal was wrongly imprisoned and should be released. Ayşe Süeda Ünal, who is his niece and lawyer, told CPJ in late 2026 that they tried to appeal to the journalist’s arrest based on this report, but the attempted appeal was not accepted by Turkish courts.
Case history
Two months before the 2016 coup attempt, a court ordered the government to appoint trustees to manage Feza Media Group, which formerly published Zaman, saying the company had links to FETÖ/PDY. The government then used emergency powers it assumed after the failed coup to order the newspaper closed. Police arrested dozens of former Zaman journalists on terrorism charges, citing their former employment at the newspaper as evidence.
In July 2017, the state-run Anatolia News Agency reported that prosecutors presented a 228-page indictment against Ünal to the 2nd Uşak Court of Serious Crimes. The indictment did not specify exact charges but said authorities identified Ünal as a leader of FETÖ and claimed he was “managing the media operations of FETÖ.”
The journalist faced two life sentences without the possibility of parole, plus a further 29 years and six months imprisonment if convicted.
The indictment claimed Ünal was close to and in direct contact with Gülen; had traveled abroad 46 times and met with Gülen on most trips; and translated some of Gülen’s books, Anatolia reported. The indictment said Ünal had an app called Kakoa Talk, which is similar to the encrypted Bylock communication app that authorities claimed was evidence of FETÖ membership. Ünal also had an account at Bank Asya, which the government also claimed was evidence of FETÖ membership.
The first hearing of the trial was held on January 4, 2018. In his testimony, Ünal said the only connection he had with the Fethullah Gülen community was as a columnist and translator. He said he had an account at Bank Asya because that was how he was paid for his work at Zaman.
Ünal denied installing the Kakoa Talk program on his phone, denied all the charges against him, and said he was against military coups.
During a July 18, 2018, hearing, Ünal said he did not travel to the U.S. under the orders of an organization and did not have a close relationship with Gülen, reports said.
“I have no activity but my writing. I am on trial for my ideas. I just wrote columns,” Ünal said at the hearing. The prosecution and their witnesses argued that Ünal was a close adviser to Gülen.
On November 14, 2018, a court in Uşak convicted Ünal of “founding and leading an armed terrorist organization” and sentenced him to 19 years and six months in prison. The court acquitted the journalist of coup-related charges.
In his final statement to the court, Ünal said that he was not named as an organization leader in any other FETÖ trials, so he did not understand why he was being tried as one.
“I have no connections to any terrorist organizations. I started to travel to the U.S. after 1996 for translating books. I have met with Fethullah Gülen five to six times. He liked me asking questions, so I have had some meetings. I do not know anybody from the organization’s structure in the military, judiciary, or police. The prosecution accuses me of ‘attempting to overthrow the constitutional order.’ I heard of the coup on July 16, on the TV,” he said.
Ayşe Süeda Ünal told CPJ in late 2019 that a local court rejected their appeal in April of that year without a hearing. In a phone interview in late 2021, she said the Constitutional Court rejected their appeal in December 2020, and the Supreme Court of Appeals rejected their appeal of Ünal’s convictions in April 2021.
She said she filed another appeal to the Constitutional Court in June 2021 for violation of the right to a fair trial, which was rejected in 2022. She brought the case to the attention of the European Court of Human Rights in January 2023 but as of late 2026, the case was yet to be heard, she told CPJ.
Ünal was transferred to a hospital in July 2020 due to an enlarged heart and was later returned to Izmir No. 1 F-Type Prison in Izmir province’s Buca district, his niece said. She said the journalist had low hemoglobin levels and suffered from malnutrition.
In November 2024, Ayşe Süeda Ünal told CPJ that the then-70-year-old journalist did not have any additional health problems but was experiencing difficulties due to his advanced age.
In November 2026, she told CPJ that the journalist remains in the same prison in Izmir.
CPJ’s email to the Turkish Ministry of Justice in November 2026 did not receive any reply.