Turkey has formally withdrawn a request for German help in investigating nearly 700 German firms suspected of backing terrorism, an Interior Ministry spokesman said on July 24, removing a major irritant in frayed ties between the two NATO allies.
Illustrator Tarık Tolunay has sketched the proceedings in the courtroom during the first hearing of Cumhuriyet daily trial.
The trial of 12 imprisoned Cumhuriyet newspaper journalists is a warning that democracy and human rights are fragile everywhere
• Muratcan Sabuncu is the son of editor-in-chief Murat Sabuncu and president of Sorbonne Human Rights AssociationWe all know the story of the small child who piped up “the emperor has no clothes” while everybody was pretending to admire the despot parading through the streets. This child is analogous to those who, in the same spirit of honesty, have come out to tell the truth in today’s Turkey. The truth-tellers are in fact the real patriots, and they succeeded in becoming the conscience of a country by dispelling the fog clouding our perceptions to show us reality.
If found guilty, the 17 writers and managers could be jailed for decades.
The German government is planning a “reorientation” of its relations with Ankara in response to the arrest of human rights activists in Turkey. The government has changed its advice for those wishing to travel to the country and cooperation on armament as well as loans and investments are to be revised. Europe’s papers examine the interests behind this change in tone.
Seventeen executives and journalists from daily Cumhuriyet, including Ahmet Şık, Kadri Gürsel and Musa Kart, went on trial July 24 with terror-related offences in the 27th Heavy Penal Court in Istanbul