Turkish nationalist group lays wreath in front of Armenian newspaper

ISTANBUL

A group of Turkish nationalists left black wreaths in front of Agos, the bilingual Turkish-Armenian weekly, in the early hours of April 24 in an apparently aggressive move against the newspaper, whose editor Hrant Dink was murder by a nationalist in 2007.

Two unidentified people came to the front door of the newspaper’s building in Istanbul’s central Şişli neighborhood at 7:15 a.m. in local time, making a statement there, Agos reported on its website.

The newspaper also aired the photo of the wreath carrying signs of the nationalist groups. 

Turan Ocakları, one of the two groups, shared a video of the incident on a social media account, with a title “All of a sudden we are at Agos in the night.” 

Ogün Samast, a nationalist, assassinated Dink in broad daylight on a busy street outside of the office of Agos in Istanbul’s Şişli district. Samast is serving a sentence of 22 years and 10 months in a high-security prison. Yasin Hayal and police informant Erhan Tuncel are accused of encouraging Samast to kill Dink in the Black Sea province of Trabzon.