Turkey Jails Journalist Derya Okatan Over Alleged State Documents

Turkish authorities have jailed journalist Derya Okatan on allegations of possessing classified state documents, in a case that could send the veteran reporter to prison for up to eight years if convicted.

Okatan, who most recently worked for independent broadcaster TELE1, was detained at her home in Ankara on October 2 before being transferred to Istanbul, where a criminal court ordered her arrest pending trial on the same day.

Her lawyer, Ziya Ergin, told the Committee to Protect Journalists that the case centres on files found on a hard drive that police had previously seized from Okatan in 2019. Authorities questioned her about 20 PowerPoint presentations, 214 Word documents, 49 Excel files and 10 PDF files, which they allege contain classified information.

Ergin said police had made a digital copy of the same hard drive during the 2019 investigation. Okatan, in a message sent from prison through her lawyer, said she did not know when the files were placed on the device or who put them there.

Okatan faces between three and eight years in prison if convicted under Article 327 of Turkey’s Penal Code, which covers obtaining information that must be kept confidential for reasons of national security or political interests.

The Committee to Protect Journalists called for her immediate release and a forensic examination of the hardware involved.

“We are deeply concerned about the intensification of the Turkish authorities’ campaign against independent journalists,” said Özgür Öğret, CPJ’s Turkey representative. “Derya Okatan must be freed without delay while a proper forensic examination is carried out of the hardware involved.”

Source: FSX Business News