The Hazardous Mission of Journalists

Discussing the deal with the Saudi prince, President Trump, referring to one piece of equipment which is worth $500 million, jokingly said, “Of course, this is peanuts for you.” In that kind of relationship, one human life must be worth less than a peanut.

Turkey has taken a more serious stand and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has vowed to pursue the issue “personally.”

However, Ali Shahibi, head of the Arabia Foundation, a pro-Saudi think tank in the US, has said, “If Jamal is still missing or God forbid, dead, then the judgement should be left to an independent investigation carried out by a credible international party. The Turks are not a neutral party.”

Erdogan already has the blood of journalists on his hand. He is one of the major torturers of journalists in the world and it is a most cynical stand for him to pretend to speak in defense of people in that profession.

Just last week, as Erdogan was visiting Germany, he warned that he would not attend a press conference if the prominent Turkish journalist Can Dundar were in attendance. The journalist, who lives in exile now in Germany, was the editor in chief of the Turkish daily Cumhuriyet, before Erdogan sacked all independent journalists and put them behind bars. Dundar himself was sentenced to more than five years in prison. The day that he was convicted, there was assassination attempt against him. In response, he quipped, “In the space of two hours, we have experienced two assassination attempts. One was done with a gun, the other was judicial. This confirms that journalism is on trial.”

Dundar was charged with betraying state secrets, because his newspaper had written about catching Erdogan red-handed as he was supplying arms to terrorists in Syria.

Erdogan’s government has its own deep state to persecute and assassinate journalists. Hrant Dink was one of the victims of that state-sponsored system of terrorism.

Supposedly, Erdogan had dismantled the deep state which was operating under the code name Ergenekon and he replaced that system with his own. During his attempt to rid the nation of Ergenekon, he arrested many high-level military officers and civil servants, in essence neutralizing a sector that could pose him a threat, rather than concern for values or rights.

The previous deep state, which was in collusion with the government security forces, used the Grey Wolves extremist group to commit political assassinations. One highly-publicized case was the murder of a prominent journalist, Abdi Ipekçi, who promoted minority rights in Turkey and advocated reconciliation with Greece. He was gunned down on February 1, 1979. Two members of the ultra-nationalist Grey Wolves, Oral Celik and Mehmet Ali Agça, were apprehended. Agça received a life sentence but after serving six months, he escaped from the prison with the help of sympathetic military officers. Later on, he was sent to kill Pope John Paul II in 1981. How could this criminal escape from prison, cross borders, carrying guns, if he did not have government support?

Successive Turkish administrations not only have provided guns and protection to the murderers. They also have built up the hatred against independent journalists to make the crime even more palatable.

Accusing Erdogan and the pro-government media of whipping up a frenzy of hatred against him, Dundar said, “We know very well who showed me as a target. This is the result of provocation. If you turn someone into so much of a target, this is what happens.”

That targeted hatred is exactly what happened to the late journalist Hrant Dink, who was shot to death as he was standing trial for violating Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code which addresses “denigrating Turkishness.”

This state persecution of the Turkish-Armenian journalist was coupled with a media campaign against him. He was assassinated on January 19, 2007. The murderer was identified as Ogun Samast, and he reportedly shouted, “I shot the infidel.”

Dink’s funeral was attended by many government officials, but Erdogan himself had an excuse to miss it because he said he had to attend the scheduled inauguration of the Mount Bolu Tunnel.

Dink’s assassination became the most celebrated such case after the death of Abdi Ipekçi. Huge crowds participated in the funeral and condemnation of the incident swept through Europe.

As Erdogan “personally pursues” the Khashoggi case, he has hundreds of journalists rotting in jail cells and many others murdered by his security forces.

Despite all adversities and dangers, professional journalists continue their dedication to their vocation to bring out the truth to hold governments accountable and to keep society sane.