The pressure on Cumhuriyet continues: Further confidentiality order passed for Emre İper

Procedures are continuing at the Anti-Terrorism Branch Directorate in Vatan Street into our newspaper’s accounting employee Emre İper, who was arrested the evening before last, and our transport functionary Yavuz Yakışkan. Yakışkan has now spent his third day under arrest. A confidentiality order has been placed over İper’s file, too. Our paper’s lawyers have not even been told what İper and Yakışkan stand charged with. It has been learnt that İper is being held in a neighbouring cell to Yavuz Yakışkan, and they are in good health. A confidentiality order has been placed over İper’s file.

They must be released

Our paper’s lawyers say that our employees must be released immediately once their statements have been taken. Our lawyers have said, ‘Even if there is no comment from the police and public prosecution, it is apparent that they are being questioned in relation to the untruthful accusations against our detained columnists and managers, because the witnesses who were heard three months ago in the ongoing investigation against our columnists and managers were asked questions about Yavuz Yakışkan. Furthermore, Emre İper’s name appears in pseudonym form in the indictment that was drafted. Despite this, the way that this was not pursued in the indictment and the impression created of a fresh investigation shows that an open-ended investigation is being conducted. We expect an immediate end to these arrests that come as a continuation of the unjust charges and detentions to which our columnists and managers are being subjected, and for our colleagues to be released.’

His children were asleep

The five police officers who staged the raid on İper’s home in Erenköy searched every corner of the house. İper’s wife Sema İper, noting that their two children were asleep at the time of the search, said, ‘The police officers went about it in a calm way. They didn’t wake up the kids. They looked in every room, in the kitchen, in drawers and even in the fridge.’