Solidarity with Turkish journalists and Gizbert

The Union of Cyprus Journalists (UCJ) has joined its voice with the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and other organisations to deplore the recent arrests of five journalists and 18 other citizens by the Turkish police.

Turkish journalists Ibrahim Cicek, Sedat Senoglu, Ziya Ulusoi, Bayram Namaz and Fusun Erdogan are being accused of participating in ‘an outlawed communist organisation’ and were taken to the antiterrorist police headquarters in Constantinople (Istanbul).

UCJ says these headquarters are notorious for torture, noting that the fact the Turkish authorities have not made any announcement ’causes concern even for the lives of the detainees.’

‘We demand that the arrested persons be released immediately, that the policy of pursuits, imprisonments and tortures of innocent citizens in Turkey be terminated, and that the personal rights, polyphony, freedom of press and all human rights to information in the neighbouring country be safeguarded,’ UCJ says.

UCJ also issued a press release about journalist Richard Gizbert who was dismissed from ‘NBC News’ because he refused to participate in a reporting mission to Iraq, and expressed its unreserved and active support to his ‘unequal and just’ struggle.

IFJ has called for worldwide solidarity with Gizbert so that the refusal of journalists to participate in life-threatening missions can be established by law.