Journalist says he can not keep up with trials

Vercihan Ziflioğlu ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News

Journalist Ertuğrul Mavioğlu said he could not keep up with all the lawsuits filed against him after missing a trial Dec. 8 regarding a news article he wrote in 2008 for the daily Radikal titled “Troops blacklist each other.”

“In our country, 64 journalists have been imprisoned. They bring some of us to court and put others into prison. They want to silence us through the judiciary,” Mavioğlu told the Hürriyet Daily News yesterday.
Mavioğlu attended another trial Dec. 9 for an interview he published in the daily Radikal in 2010. He is currently being tried for his interview with Murat Karayılan, a senior leader of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), on Mount Kandil in Iraq and faces between one and three years imprisonment.
Mavioğlu also said he had forgotten about his trial on Dec. 8 and had difficulty keeping track of all the suits filed against him.

“Sure, our freedom to write news is being curbed, but your right to receive impartial, true information is also being curbed alongside us,” Mavioğlu said, adding that it was important for the Turkish public to assume an attitude about such suits.