The report, prepared by the State Audit Institution (DDK) functioning under President Abdullah Gül’s office, released the lengthy report on Dink’s murder on Feb. 20. An İstanbul court issued a verdict on Jan. 17 after a five-year trial concerning Dink’s murder. All the suspects were acquitted of charges, though all the evidence demonstrated that the incident was an organized crime, Dink’s lawyers told the media at the time. Ogün Samast, who gunned Dink down, was sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment, but he was acquitted of the charge of membership in a terrorist organization.
The court verdict sparked major outrage in the country because the verdict said the suspects had no ties to a larger crime network but acted alone.
However, the court ruling was appealed because both the prosecution and lawyers representing the Dink family believe the killers are affiliated with the Ergenekon network, whose suspected members are currently standing trial on charges of plotting to overthrow the government.
The DDK report, in the meantime, confirmed for the first time the serious negligence of Turkish intelligence, which ultimately culminated in Dink’s murder.
Dink’s lawyers had waged a persistent judicial battle to have the civil servants who were suspected of being involved in one way or another in the process that culminated in the murder interrogated, but failed.
The DDK report provides Dink’s lawyers with strong support in their battle to have state officials interrogated. The DDK report highlighted the serious lack of coordination between the police and gendarmerie intelligence, both of whom it said failed to prevent the threat to Dink’s life.
This report’s conclusion points to the grave consequences that come from the absence of coordination between the two institutions in charge of ensuring law and order, which led to Dink’s murder.
“There were problems in institutional structures and practices in relation to the collection and evaluation of intelligence and providing individual security. Therefore, there is a need to touch on the ‘need for reform’,” the report added.
It also highlighted the absence of will within the state to lift the protective shield from the civil servants who are alleged to have committed crimes so that they can appear in court. Dink’s lawyers insisted during the course of the proceedings that a colonel from the gendarmerie as well as a police chief, both of whom are suspected of negligence with regard to preventing Dink’s murder, should be investigated.
The DDK report is now expected to pave the way for the investigation of state officials suspected of negligence in Dink’s murder. This country has witnessed several murders of non-Muslim Turkish citizens, with recent ones being the murder of a priest, Father Andrea Santoro, several years ago by a young man as well as the murder of a German citizen in Malatya in 2007. In the same incident in Malatya, two of the victims were Turkish converts from Islam.
All the murderers who have been caught are alleged to have been acting alone, but such allegations have failed to convince the general public.
These murders prove the existence of a powerful network of ultra-nationalists who brainwash young men to turn them into hitmen to achieve their goal of undermining democratic reforms.
Turkey also needs a law that will criminalize those committing hate crimes.
