Former Cumhuriyet editor Dündar says wife banned from leaving Turkey

ANKARA

Cumhuriyet Ankara bureau chief Erdem Gül (L), editor-in-chief Can Dündar (C) and his wife, Dilek Dündar, are seen after a hearing an Istanbul courthouse in a ffile photo. DHA photo

The wife of the former editor-in-chief of Turkey's top opposition daily Cumhuriyet was banned on Sept. 3 from flying to Germany and her passport seized, her husband said on Twitter.

Less than three weeks after Can Dündar stepped down from the paper, Dilek Dündar was told she could not fly to Berlin at Istanbul's Ataturk Airport, state-run Anadolu Agency said. The passaport Dündar was using was a formerly cancelled one, Anadolu said.  

Her passport had been cancelled last month, Cumhuriyet added.

The agency said Dündar's passport was seized and she left after being told she could not leave the country.

Dündar was defiant on Twitter, saying he and his wife would not be intimidated.

"They took my wife hostage. Law of the jungle. But in vain. Neither I nor a woman who jumped on top of a gun can be frightened of this," he said, referring to an incident in May when his wife grappled with a gunman who tried to shoot her husband outside an Istanbul court.

Dündar was sentenced by the court in May to five years and 10 months in prison for allegedly revealing state secrets in a story on the Turkish intelligence. 

Cumhuriyet's report in May 2015 was on a shipment of arms intercepted at the Syrian border in January 2014, with Erdogan warning Dündar himself he would "pay a heavy price."
Dundar is believed to be outside the country after he was freed earlier this year pending an appeal following his trial.

Last month, he said he would not surrender himself to the Turkish courts because he had lost faith in the judiciary after the failed July 15 coup and the three-month state of emergency imposed in the days after.

"To trust such a judiciary would be like putting one's head under the guillotine," he wrote in a Cumhuriyet column entitled "time to say farewell."

"Therefore, I've decided not to surrender to this judiciary at least until the state of emergency is lifted."