Çelik freed after 304 days in the social media trial - no release for Kanaat and Öğreten

 
CANAN COŞKUN

Of the journalists who are facing DHKP-C, FETO/PDY and PKK/KCK charges, Ömer Çelik was released at the end of the first hearing. Conversely, Kaanat and Öğreten’s continued detention was ordered. The proceedings have been adjourned until 6 December.

 
Journalists Tunca Öğreten, Mahir Kanaat and Ömer Çelik, who were detained on DHKP-C, FETO/PDY and PKK/KCK charges for having reported on information in President Tayyip Erdoğan’s son-in-law and Minister of Energy and Natural Resources Berat Albayrak’s personal email account appeared before a judge for the first time in 304 days. The court, which ordered Çelik’s release, ruled that Öğreten and Kanaat remain in detention. The court ordered Öğreten and Kanaat to participate at the hearing adjourned until 6 December from Silivri Prison. Former Diken news site editor, Tunca Öğreten, stating that he was detained on a tip-off by a hacker, said, “There is not a single statement in the report I authored that supports the allegations in the indictment.” Öğreten, recalling the allegation in the indictment that he was unable to account for how he had obtained Minister Albayrak’s emails, said, “The indictment says that these emails were procured by hackers who were DHKP-C sympathisers and then passed on to me. This statement is proof that the prosecutor knows the answer. This thus demolishes the accusation of misappropriating personal data.”
 
Öğreten, recalling the comment in the indictment with reference to Albayrak’s emails that they were “as circumstances dictate, state secrets,” said, “Information is either a state secret or it is not. The stolen account content was from Albayrak’s Hotmail and Yahoo accounts. If these are state secrets, what business do they have there?” Öğreten, saying he was accused of committing a crime on behalf of FETO for a report about a private company named PowerTrans that operates in Iraq, said, “I have the amazing talent of committing crimes for two diametrically opposed organisations. It is beyond my comprehension.” Öğreten, saying that all Albayrak’s emails were on WikiLeaks, commented, “Is something known to seven billion people a secret?”
 
I have been unable to see my son
 
BirGün newspaper staffer Mahir Kanaat, in turn, said, “It is said that I set up the Twitter group over which charges have been filed. RedHack has announced that they set up this group themselves and decided themselves who they would include. I was also included in this group involuntarily. I neither downloaded nor inspected these emails. How can I create perception with a non-existent report?” Kanaat, stating that his conversation with detained Die Welt reporter Deniz Yücel was made the subject of charges, said, “Deniz Yücel is a journalist. It is as normal for me to have a record of a conversation with a journalist as it is for a judge to converse with a judge. The FETO accusation is a black stain. It serves to conceal the true criminals.” Kanaat, noting that it was the RedHack group that hacked the emails, said, “I have been in jail for ten months with no guilt or evidence. I had a son in this time. I have been unable to see him for ten months. My son does not know me. He is experiencing birth-related health problems. I have been unable to be at his side.”
 
News Manager of closed Dicle News Agency, Ömer Çelik, who was beaten up by the police while being arrested with them saying, “Why did you report this news?” said in his defence that he made in Kurdish, “The police who came to my home leaned heavily on me and subjected me to torture for two hours. They were so calm about it that they lay me down in the slush on the balcony in December and continued their torture here. I could have been executed by the police at home. The police spent a long time debating among themselves in my vicinity whether to kill me.” Çelik, saying he did not know how the emails over which charges are raised had been procured, commented, “Having witnessed in the content of the emails I inspected relationships that were unlawful and did not befit his excellency the Minister’s position, I reported on these.”