EU MPs TO ATTEND TRIAL OF TOP TURKISH AUTHOR
Istanbul, 30 Nov. (AKI) - A delegation of observers from the European Parliament will attend the upcoming trial of Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk, due to start on 16 December, the European Peoples Party in Strasbourg said in a statement. The delegation will be headed by Dutch Euro-MP Camiel Eurlieng. Pamuk, one of Turkey's best known authors, faces three years in jail for making controversial comments about his country's killing of Armenians and Kurds.
Orhan Pamuk has been charged with insulting Turkey's national character by telling a Swiss newspaper that one million Armenians and 30,000 Kurds were killed in Turkey but that nobody dared to say so. "We will observe the court proceedings in the same ways as another European Parliamentary team did at the trial of [Kurdish activist] Lleyla Zana and others in 2003 and 2004," said Eurlieng. She added that the team would "verify the implementation of constitutional reforms and evaluate their compatibility with EU norms on human rights."
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