Journalists Hüseyin Aykol, the former co-editor-in-chief of the shuttered pro-Kurdish newspaper Özgür Gündem, İnan Kızılkaya, the newspaper’s former managing editor, and Evrensel columnist İhsan Çaralan were convicted of “insulting the President of the Republic” in an article published in Özgür Gündem in 2016 during the editors-in-Chief on Watch campaign in solidarity with Özgür Gündem.

While Aykol and Kızılkaya have been separately sentenced to 1 year, 10 months, and 26 days in prison, Çaralan has been ordered a prison sentence of 11 months and 20 days. The court board, which has deferred the pronouncement of the judgment, has not ordered the same ruling for Aykol. Accordingly, the execution of the prison sentence Hüseyin Aykol has not been suspended.

22 November 2024

The 2nd Criminal Court of First Instance of Istanbul dropped the case against journalists İnan Kızılkaya and İhsan Çaralan, who were on trial for “insulting the President” over a news report published in Özgür Gündem newspaper. The journalists had faced up to 4 years and 8 months in prison under Article 299 of the Turkish Penal Code. The court ruled to dismiss the case because the probation period of a previous “deferment of the announcement of the verdict” (HAGB) decision had expired. Earlier, the prosecutor had argued that the Constitutional Court’s violation ruling did not relate to the substance of the trial, but only to the HAGB aspect, and had requested the conviction of Çaralan and Kızılkaya.