Journalists visiting Diyarbakır: "We are here to remove disinformation"

Originally published by Bianet English

We, eight journalists are in Diyarbakır as the second group of News Watch. Our second visit in Diyarabkır was to Diyarbakır Bar. We were greeted by Bar Administrator Board members Cihan İpek, Servet Özer and Bar General Secretary Abdullah Coşar at the bar managed by Ahmet Özmen after the murder of previous president Tahir Elçi.

Coming to Diyarbakır with the second group of the News Watch, the Chief Editor of the daily Evrensel, Fatih Polat, explained the causes of why they are present in the province as journalists and why they visited Diyarbakır Bar as follows: “Our goal here is to remove disinformation and convey what is happening through every angle to people. Besides, our colleagues undergo similar things as in 1990. This is what has come over Refik Tekin . “Gun is being held against head of our colleagues in the East while they are being threatened with life imprisonment in the West. We know we will never be free like that”.

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Ahmet Özmen has expressed that journalists’ watch has caused a great stir for both themselves and the journalists in the region. Noting how the curfews are different than the ones in 1990s, Özmen has made the following statement referring to the interlocutory injunction demanded for curfews rejected by the European Court of Human rights (ECtHR).

“What matters is not decision of ECtHR but Turkey’s plea. Besides, ECtHR has dismissed the interlocutory injunction without prejudice. So, the ECtHR hasn’t ruled that there is no violation there, but emphasized that the violations will be fixed. Turkey carried out lobbying activities”. Özmen, stating that 198 civilians have been killed in cities under curfew - out of which 39 are children- expressed that curfew does not merely restrain a right but violates right of people in a region, which is contrary to ECtHR decisions.

News Watch of the journalists will continue tomorrow as well.

Journalists taking part to the second group of the News Watch are: Pınar Öğünç from Cumhuriyet daily, Agos weekly Chief Editor Yetvart Danzikyan, Mesut Bayram from Sol Haber Portalı (Left News Portal), freelance journalist Tuğba Tekerek, journalist-writer Fehim Işık, Zeynep Yüncüler from BirGün daily, Elif Akgül from bianet, and Evrensel daily Chief Editor Fatih Polat.