 |
Controversial Hürriyet editor-in-chief resigns
Holding an emergency meeting with his colleagues at the newspaper yesterday, Özkök tearfully delivered a farewell speech and announced his decision to resign from his post, adding that he would no longer be at the helm of the newspaper starting on Jan. 2.
Özkök explained that his decision to resign came following a meeting with Aydın Doğan last Saturday, the owner of Doğan Media Group, to which Hürriyet is a member.
“For the first time, I slept for seven hours during the night. I have become very tired over the 20 years I have worked as the editor-in-chief of this newspaper. Until three years ago, I was working seven days a week. Nobody could believe it. I had been working for six days a week for the past three years. I am tired,” Özkök said.
“That was a good life,” he said during his final remarks.
Özkök will be replaced by Enis Berberoğlu, the newspaper’s Ankara representative, and he will continue to work for the daily as a columnist.
Being the editor-in-chief of the flagship newspaper of the Doğan Media Group, Özkök has been held by some as responsible for the deterioration of the group’s relations with the government. Through reports on pivotal developments concerning the country’s future, Özkök has sided with anti-democratic formations and adopted a stance against moves aimed at expanding freedoms in the country.
In one of the most striking incidents that is still fresh in many minds, Özkök’s Hürriyet covered the passage of a bill in Parliament in 2008 that would allow covered students to have access to university education with the headline: “411 hands raised for chaos,” referring to the passage of the bill by a record number of 411 deputies in the 550-seat Parliament.
Back then, the Hürriyet daily was severely criticized by democratic circles and the government for failing to show respect for the nation’s will, which was reflected through the passage of the aforementioned bill in Parliament.
In addition, in the days before the Feb. 28, 1997 unarmed military intervention that resulted in the coalition government led by the Islamist-leaning Welfare Party (RP) being overthrown, Özkök’s Hürriyet ran a large number of fabricated stories warning of Islamic fundamentalism. Some of these stories were cited as evidence by National Security Council (MGK) generals in a statement the council issued that had led to the uprooting of the government.
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| BÜLENT KENEŞ |  |
||
| If the judiciary can't call MİT to account for its deeds, then Parliament should | |||
| AMANDA PAUL |  |
||
| Gas is cut while Europe freezes | |||
| MÜMTAZER TÜRKÖNE |  |
||
| The Kurdish issue has divided the state | |||
| BERİL DEDEOĞLU |  |
||
| Latest state of affairs in Turkey | |||
| ABDULLAH BOZKURT |  |
||
| Private debt stock in Turkey | |||
| CUMALİ ÖNAL |  |
||
| US, Israel will not attack Iran | |||
| DOĞU ERGİL |  |
||
| ‘Religious youth’ | |||
| JOOST LAGENDIJK |  |
||
| Helpless in the face of disaster | |||
| MELİH ARAT |  |
||
| ‘Future, Inc.’ | |||
| GÖKHAN BACIK |  |
||
| Partition of Syria among the Great Powers: The solution? | |||
| EMRE USLU |  |
||
| MİT | |||
| CHARLOTTE MCPHERSON |  |
||
| Every child matters | |||
| BERK ÇEKTİR |  |
||
| New veterinary hospital regulations (1) | |||
| ŞAHİN ALPAY |  |
||
| Systemic gaps in government authority in Turkey | |||
| MARKAR ESAYAN |  |
||
| MİT crisis and old state | |||
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
