Turkish woman's fight for free speech - 29 Apr 2008

Turkish legislators are considering a proposal to soften a controversial law which severely restricts freedom of speech. Turkey has been under pressure to abolish or overhaul Article 301 as part of its campaign for European Union membership. The law was passed in 2005, part of a package of penal laws making it a crime to "insult Turkishness". Since then, many writers who claim Turkey committed genocide against Armenians in 1915 have been prosecuted, including murdered journalist Hrant Dink. Prison sentences have ranged between six months and three years. But the new proposal plans to reduce the maximum sentence to two years. Al Jazeera visited one woman who has 19 legal cases against her because of the law. This is her story.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• al
• jazeera
• aljazeera
• article
• 301
• turkey
• first
• person

[studio7manga]

There is no freedom of speech anywhere, just varying degrees of the oppression of speech.

[sana6]

yeah i hope you win! but to all the western viewers that are gonna comment on the hypocriosy of the west hear this: you really think they is freedom of speech in the west. it doesn't take a genius to figure that out, all you have to take is a media relations course in university and you will see all the powers the gov't has to stop things circulating in the media. ever heard of censorship, its all over the world! and we are all too dumb to realize it

[atik2917]

nobel ????

orhan pamuk ?????

firstly read nobel's history !! who is nobel ??????

and after read Ataturk's bursa oration !!!

[pornpan96]

i can imagine why ur under investigation cuz ur an anti- turkish govermnet person and you prob wont last,,, i doubt that you do practice law rather try to find the law and regulations against you and u ethnic, .,means ur either a kurd or another ethnic and thats what ur gonna get wiith the way you wanna practiice law in republic of TURKEY...

[gone2qatar]

the fact that she can voice her opinion in front of a courthouse and the fact that demostrators can protest show that Turkey is not an authoritarian regime.

yes, the army tries to control peoples of all opinions but how much does it really affect people's lives? not that much. stop bashing turkey and put stress on the military guys who are very dear to israel, usa and some secret agencies.

[TurksSayNo2EUfuckyou]

Kurds treat their women like shit and Turks to blame for it. Why armos and kurds are so obsessed with Turks? Could it be jealousy? If you fucking morons put so much energy on humanizing yourselves, you possibly evolve just like every other cultures. FUCKING APES!!!

[killawazhere]

now this is what i call a freedom fighter

with out any conflict

not like pkk how can they be freedom fighters if there killing innocent people and have been known as a terrorist organisation now....

[killawazhere]

ffs fuck armenians they attacked turks first

use sud of seen the armenians what they did to turkish people they where boiling peoples babies and starting fires in peoples stomach

ffs thats why u never ever fuck with turks

just remember

play with a toy play with a knife play wth a turk and will fuck with ur life

[2pure]

fuck u all turks suck my dick wit your people

[aslizz]

in french there is a law that if u disagree about armenian genocide, u go to prison. what about that? ppl do a researh about article 301, it says insulting turkishness is a crime and thats all. insulting every nation is must be a crime. this is a brainwashing video

[fjt108]

They have no objective information as there is censorship and writers are prosecuted for their thoughts. Turkey has a long way to go be considered Modern.

[fjt108]

Turkey is a military regime thinly disguised as democracy. You can see from some of the answers below that there are a lot of Brainwashed Turks.