From La Forge
Organ of the Communist Party of the Workers of France
April, 1997

Paris, April 4, 1997
To the Consulate General of Turkey in Paris

We Demand Justice for Metin Goktepe

Metin Goktepe, journalist for the daily newspaper Evrensel, was assassinated in cold blood by the police, in front of hundreds of witnesses, while he was on a professional mission on January 8, 1996, in Istanbul.

Since then, the assassins (48 police officers have been implicated) have not been interrogated. They have not appeared in court. They are protected by the special law concerning officials. As to the authorities, having finally accepted that this was an assassination, they always forgot the files. They sent the files from one town to another, from one tribunal to another, for more than 14 months. Today, we are not sure that the police officers will be present at the third hearing that is presently being held at Afyon, and that they will be punished.

We declare to public opinion, and especially to our government by your intermediary, that we will continue to pursue the case of Metin Goktepe, until they police are judged.

We will continue to pursue this case until there are no longer journalists who are threatened, attacked, tortured, "disappeared" and assassinated because they are doing their job as journalists.

We will continue to pursue this case so that the assassins of Metin Goktepe do not remain unpunished, like many other assassins.

And finally, we will continue to pursue this case because we believe in freedom of expression, of information, which are elementary democratic rights.

Democratic Association of Workers of Turkey (ADTT)

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