BRUSSELS • The European Commission told Turkey yesterday it will have to rewrite its penal code again to meet EU standards after the country’s highest court confirmed a sentence against an editor for insulting “Turkishness”.
EU Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn said the High Court of Appeals ruling in the case of Hrant Dink, editor-in-chief of the bilingual Turkish and Armenian weekly Agos, showed Turkey’s reformed penal code still restricted freedom of expression.
“I am disappointed by this judgment, which limits the exercise of freedom of expression in Turkey,” Rehn said in a statement. The ruling would set a binding precedent for other pending human rights cases, he said.
“I would therefore urge the Turkish authorities to amend Article 301 and other vaguely formulated articles in order to guarantee freedom of expression in Turkey,” Rehn said, noting that this was a key political criterion for EU accession.
He said the Commission would review the situation in the light of the EU’s political criteria in its upcoming progress report in Turkey in late October or early November.
Dink, a Turkish-born Armenian, was given a six-month suspended prison sentence last year for an article criticising Article 301, which allows prosecutors to pursue cases against writers and scholars for “insulting Turkish identity”.
The top court’s sentencing board on Tuesday upheld the suspended jail sentence.
Dink voiced dismay in a statement sent to Reuters and said he would make a final appeal to the European Court of Human Rights since his legal recourse in Turkey had been exhausted.
“I am of course deeply upset by the verdict of Penal Council of Supreme Court concerning my case but the verdict itself did not surprise me,” Dink said.
“The verdict of the Supreme Court concerning myself reveals that Article 301 and the other similar ones can never suit a democratic Turkey and should be immediately abolished,” he said.
The executive European Commission can recommend suspending negotiations with Turkey in cases of a serious and persistent breach of human rights or democracy. The Ankara government has repeatedly said writers have not served time in prison under laws related to freedom of expression.
But Dink and other intellectuals have faced prosecution under Article 301 for calling into question the official Turkish version of what happened to the Armenians in Ottoman Turkey and EU officials say the proceedings are themselves an unacceptable form of intimidation restricting freedom of speech.
