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Alleged assassination plot puts spotlight on press cards
Gendarmerie and police teams launched an operation to capture the suspects after they received information that two military officers -- Maj. İbrahim G. and Col. Erkan Yılmaz B. -- were planning to assassinate the deputy prime minister. The teams spotted two suspicious vehicles in the vicinity of Arınç’s house.
One of the vehicles belonged to the General Staff while the other was hired from a private car rental company. Turkish dailies claimed yesterday that one of the officers had tried to swallow a piece of paper when he saw the gendarmerie and police teams approaching. The paper featured Arınç’s home address. Police also found several maps showing Arınç’s house in the two vehicles.
The security forces also allegedly found a fake press card in the search of the suspects’ houses but there were no further details of which media organization’s name was on the press card and if it was imitation of the one’s issued by the Prime Ministry Directorate General of Press and Information.
In Turkey, press cards are issued by the Prime Ministry Directorate General of the Press and Information and other state offices usually distribute their own accreditation cards, like the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Presidential Palace and the Prime Ministry. Parliament distributes its own accreditation cards after the examination of a commission in which the Association of Parliamentary Correspondents are represented.
The prosecutors are examining possible links between two suspected military officers and shady networks, including Ergenekon which is a shadowy group suspected of trying to overthrow the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government.
Doğan Tılıç from the Middle East Technical University (METU) Media and Cultural Studies Program said that there are many dark aspects to the subject and this is the real danger.
“For real journalists, to have a press card became dangerous, they were even killed. But the alleged criminals are using them as a sort of protective shield,” Tılıç told Today’s Zaman.
“But not to know and not to be able to reach accurate information leads us to a totalitarian regime. There is a blanket of darkness over everything claiming to be fighting against the darkness,” he said.
Ahmet Abakay, the chairperson of the Contemporary Journalists’ Association, also underlined the existence of the dark aspects of the plot and said that as a part of these, the press card which was found in the house of one of the suspects should be investigated very carefully, too: “Who supplied it, which organization? It is quite common for security forces to sometimes use press cards at social events to film the participants. All these things bring extra difficulties to journalism in Turkey,” Abakay said.
He added that in order to prevent this kind of misapplication of press identity cards, they should be issued by professional journalistic organizations.
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