Turkish Journalist Who Reported Erdogan-ISIS Ties Sentenced to 27 Years in Prison

Breitbart ^ | 12/23/2020 | Frances Martel

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Can Dündar, the former editor-in-chief of the anti-Islamist Turkish newspaper Cumhuriyet, received a 27-year prison sentence Wednesday for allegedly aiding a terrorist group by publishing a news story.

Dündar left Turkey in 2016, stepping down from the top post at Turkey’s oldest national newspaper, following a public assassination attempt on the steps of the courthouse. Cumhuriyet has endured police action and prosecutions at all levels — from editor-in-chief to cafeteria cook — for publishing stories unfavorable to Islamist President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Dündar and his Ankara bureau chief, Erdem Gül, initially faced legal action in 2016 after publishing a report that Erdogan was using Turkey’s intelligence infrastructure to smuggle weapons into Syria, to aid rebels fighting dictator Bashar al-Assad. Erdogan publicly opposed Assad’s rule and has repeatedly referred to him as a “terrorist,” but the bombshell report revealed Erdogan was also covertly aiding Assad’s enemies. The Cumhuriyet report featured photos of the alleged smuggled weapons.

Cumhuriyet subsequently published reports accusing Erdogan of aiding Islamic State jihadists in Syria. Dündar has maintained for years that Erdogan’s administration, a formal ally of the United States through NATO, has concrete ties to ISIS jihadists.

“Turkey has been hosting ISIS for years,” Dündar told Kurdistan 24 last year. “Everyone knows it in the region.”

Following the detentions of both senior staffers, Turkish police arrested another 17 editors and other employees at Cumhuriyet, charging them similarly with aiding terrorists in 2017.

An Istanbul court tried Dündar in absentia this year and ruled on Wednesday that he was guilty of aiding Islamic cleric Fethullah Gülen — a U.S.-based Erdogan opponent whose religious organization, Hizmet, the Turkish state refers to as “the Fethullahist Terrorist Organization (FETO)” — despite the court’s inability to confirm any ties between Gülen and Dündar.

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