Painting of steps near Agos office does not frighten us, says daily’s editor

ISTANBUL

The editor-in-chief of the Turkish-Armenian daily Agos, Rober Koptaş, has said they are not scared after the painting of the stairs close to the newspaper’s Istanbul office, speaking in an interview with broadcaster CNN Türk on Sept. 8. 

The steps were painted by unknown individuals in the colors of Turkish football team Trabzonspor, the hometown of the assassin who in 2007 killed Agos’ then editor-in-chief, Hrant Dink. 

“Hrant Dink was killed on Jan. 19, 2007 in front of the Agos [office]. Ogün Samast, who comes from Trabzon, ran away near the steps, which are now painted in blue and claret red, after the assassination.
If some people are trying to deliver a message to us such as, ‘We killed Hrant Dink and we are still after you,’ this does not frighten us,” Koptaş was quoted as saying on CNN Türk’s website.

A new trend to paint public steps in the colors of the rainbow has become popular since a local resident painted steps in Istanbul’s Cihangir neighborhood. The municipality subsequently repainted the steps grey at the beginning of September. 

The steps close to the daily’s building in Istanbul’s Osmanbey neighborhood, where Dink was shot dead in 2007, were colored in blue and claret red, the colors of the Trabzonspor football team. Dink’s assassin Samast went to hide for a while in his hometown Trabzon after the murder.