Swedish journalist gets 11-month suspended prison term in Turkey for insulting Erdogan

Joakim Medin was fixed an 11-month suspended situation term, but helium remains successful custody awaiting the result of a abstracted trial connected terrorism-related charges. [X]

A Turkish tribunal connected Wednesday convicted a Swedish writer of insulting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Joakim Medin was fixed an 11-month suspended situation term, a media rights radical said, but helium remains successful custody awaiting the result of a abstracted trial connected terrorism-related charges.

Medin, a writer with the regular Dagens ETC, was detained March 27 arsenic helium arrived astatine Istanbul airdrome to screen past month’s nationwide protests that erupted pursuing the apprehension of Istanbul’s fashionable mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu. The writer was jailed days aboriginal connected charges of insulting Erdogan and rank of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, oregon PKK.

No trial day has been acceptable for his 2nd trial, where helium could look maximum 9 years successful prison.

Medin, who is being held successful Istanbul’s high-security Marmara Prison, joined Wednesday’s proceeding successful the superior Ankara via a video league system.

The charges against him were based connected an probe launched by the Ankara Public Prosecutors’ Office into a rally successful Stockholm connected January 11, 2023, that was attended by supporters of the PKK, and included an effigy of Erdogan hanging by his feet.

According to the Turkish Presidency’s Communications Department, the prosecutors’ bureau identified 15 suspects, including Medin, who had organized, participated oregon covered the event. It said Medin besides allegedly facilitated connection betwixt the PKK and media outlets.

During the opening hearing, Medin reported aggregate violations of his basal rights during the archetypal stages of his detention, including the close to entree to a translator, to a lawyer and consular services, according to the Media and Law Studies Association, oregon MLSA, which observed the proceeding.

He denied that helium was contiguous astatine the rally.

“The indictment begins with a protestation I did not be and includes (social media) posts I did not share,” the MLSA cited Medin arsenic telling the court.

“On January 11, 2023, a small radical of activists held a protestation successful beforehand of the metropolis hall, hanging an effigy of Erdogan upside down,” the writer continued. “I wasn’t there – I was working successful Germany astatine the time. I had nary cognition of this protestation and made nary κοινωνικά media posts astir it.”

The PKK has waged a 40-year insurgency successful Turkey which has outgo tens of thousands of lives and is designated a terrorist enactment by Ankara and its Western allies.

A bid inaugural betwixt the Turkish state and the PKK was initiated successful October, and the enactment declared a ceasefire astatine the opening of March upon a telephone to bash so by its imprisoned person Abdullah Ocalan. [AP]