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Police in Istanbul on July 25, 2016, detained Halil İbrahim Balta–a business reporter for the daily newspaper Yarına Bakış who previously worked with the shuttered daily newspaper Zaman–as part of a sweeping purge of suspected followers of exiled preacher Fethullah Gülen. The Turkish government accuses Gülen of maintaining a terrorist organization and “parallel state structure”…
Cuma Ulus, a former news editor for the shuttered daily newspaper Millet, is one of several journalists imprisoned after the failed 2016 coup attempt. He has twice been charged in joint trials. In 2018, he was acquitted of charges that linked him to the coup attempt, but found guilty of being a member of a…
Mümtaz’er Türköne, a former columnist for the shuttered daily Zaman, is serving over 10 years in prison after being convicted of “being a member of a terrorist organization.” The journalist needs surgery for a heart condition, but has delayed the procedure because of concerns about being able to recuperate safely in prison. Police in the…
Police detained Şahin Alpay, a then 72-year-old former columnist for the shuttered newspaper Zaman, at his home early in the morning of July 27, 2016, CPJ reported at the time. The court arraigned him and codefendants and fellow former Zaman journalists Ali Bulaç, Ahmet Turan Alkan, and Mustafa Ünal on charges of being members of…
Mustafa Ünal, a former reporter for the shuttered Turkish daily Zaman, was arrested shortly after the failed attempted coup of 2016, and found guilty of “being a member of a [terrorist] organization.” The journalist, who denies any involvement in the coup, is serving a 10-year, six-month prison sentence. Police detained Ünal at his home in Ankara…
Faruk Akkan, the general director of the shuttered Cihan News Agency, was arrested shortly after a failed Turkish coup attempt in 2016 and was convicted for allegedly being a member of a terrorist organization. Akkan, who denies involvement in the coup, is serving a nine-year prison sentence. Police detained Akkan at his home in Istanbul…
Ali Bulaç, a former columnist for the shuttered daily newspaper Zaman, turned himself in to police on July 27, 2016, when he learned from the press that there was a warrant for his arrest, he told Istanbul’s Fourth Court of Penal Peace at his July 30, 2016, arraignment hearing. The court arraigned him and codefendants…
Police detained Alkan, a former columnist for the shuttered newspaper Zaman, on July 27, 2016, CPJ reported at the time. The court on July 30, 2016 arraigned Alkan alongside former Zaman journalists Ali Bulaç, Şahin Alpay, and Mustafa Ünal on charges of being members of a terrorist organization. They were accused of following exiled preacher…
Tunca İlker Öğreten, a freelance journalist and former editor for the online opposition newspaper Diken, was charged, alongside four other journalists and a media worker, with terrorism and cybercrime offenses for publishing the purported emails of a Turkish minister. On January 17, 2017, an Istanbul court charged Öğreten with “blocking, disrupting [a] computing system,” “destroying…
Gültekin Avcı, a former prosecutor and a columnist for the shuttered daily Bugün, has been repeatedly detained since 2015, with his columns cited as evidence against him. He was most recently arrested in 2019, one day after he was released from prison. In December 2020, he was convicted of conspiracy and sentenced to life in…