I am Hrant Dink
2005: Imprisonment
Hrant Dink
Hrant Dink was best known for being critical of the Turkish government over issues of Armenian identity and over official versions of history in Turkey relating to the massacres of Armenians in 1915. He was repeatedly targeted for expressing his opinions.
In 2005, he was given a six-month suspended prison sentence for “denigrating Turkishness” in writings about the identity of Turkish citizens of Armenian origin.
January 10, 2007: Death Threats
Hrant Dink was the editor of Turkish-Armenian Agos newspaper
Hrant Dink had been receiving death threats for several months prior to his death. However, no action was taken by the Turkish government to protect Dink. On January 10, 2007; he wrote his last column in the newspaper about the death threats he was receiving.
January 19, 2007: Murder
Hrant Dink’s body in front of his office in Istanbul, Turkey
Hrant Dink, a Turkish citizen of Armenian descent, was assassinated outside the offices of the Agos newspaper where he was the editor. According to witnesses, the assassin shouted “I shot the infidel.”
January 20, 2007: Capture of the Assassin
Ogun Samast, the alleged killer was identified from CCTV footage
Samast was identified by his father who informed the police after he saw CCTV footage of his son on TV. He was detained on Saturday January 20, the day after the murder, in an operation at the main bus station in Samsun. Samast confessed of the murder and stated that he didn’t regret killing Hrant Dink.
Later the police announced that Yasin Hayal, an ultra-nationalist militant, also confessed to telling Samast to murder Hrant Dink.
Both, Samast and Hayal, confessed that the murder was planned by Erhan Tuncel who is allegedly a police informer.
June 4, 2010: Dink’s Lawyer
Hakan Karadag, Hrant Dink’s lawyer
One of the lawyers in the trial of the suspects of journalist Hrant Dink’s 2007 has been found in his Istanbul apartment in what appeared to be suicide. However, no official report on the cause of his death has yet been released.
July 25, 2011: Trial & Conviction
Picture of the murderer holding a Turkish flag inside the police station after 1 day from his capture
Ogun Samast, 17 years old at the time of the murder, was found guilty of shooting Hrant Dink and was sentenced to nearly 23 years in prison by a Children’s Court.
He was initially given a life sentence but the term was commuted because he was a minor at the time of the murder.
January 17, 2012: Trial Ends
Turkish demonstrators hold pictures of Hrant Dink days after his death, during a protest in Istanbul, January 2007
Against All Evidence: Turkish court lets 19 co-conspirators off hook with “lone-gunman” conviction of Yasin Hayal for killing Hrant Dink.
While over 100 Turkish Journalists and 40 Kurdish lawyers are still behind prison and treated worst for simply reporting the truth and defending justice, Turkish criminal are set free to continue murdering human right activists.
Even if they murder 100s of our journalists, new ones will be born and we will all be Hrant Dinks.
The Genocide continues!
What a shame for Turkey!
RadioYan Team – LebArmenian Blog