Prosecutor seeks life for CHP MP, 10 years for Dündar, Gül for intel trucks report

ISTANBUL

DHA photo

An Istanbul prosecutor has sought life sentences for main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) lawmaker Enis Berberoğlu, as well as 10 years in prison for daily Cumhuriyet’s former editor-in-chief, Can Dündar, and the daily’s Ankara bureau chief, Erdem Gül, over a report on intelligence trucks. 

Prosecutor Mehmet Yeşilkaya said in his indictment revealed on Jan. 11 that he sought the sentences for “aiding an armed terrorist organization knowingly and intentionally without being a member.” Yeşilkaya also sought a life sentence for Berberoğlu for announcing information that was supposed to stay secret.
Hearings will begin March 1. 

A Cumhuriyet report in May 2015 claimed that trucks allegedly owned by the National Intelligence Agency (MİT), Turkey’s state intelligence service, were found to contain weapons and ammunition that were headed for Syria when they were stopped and searched in southern Turkey in early 2014. 

An indictment was previously prepared against Berberoğlu for giving Dündar the footage of the Turkish intelligence trucks. 

Dündar and Gül faced trial for “leaking state secrets” due to stories they published about the trucks. They were arrested on Nov. 26, 2015, and released on Feb. 26, 2016, following a Constitutional Court ruling. 

An Istanbul court later sentenced Dündar and Gül to five years in prison for “leaking state secrets” on May 6, 2016.

In a book he wrote after he was released, Dündar said “a leftist lawmaker” brought him the footage on May 27, 2014. The prosecutor’s office then examined Dündar’s phone records and determined that he talked to Berberoğlu on the date that he wrote in his book.