Turkey: Journalist Hülya Kılınç Was Released 24 Hours Later
Location: Turkey, Manisa
Date: February 16, 2022Available in: 🇹🇷 Türkçe
Journalist Hülya Kılınç was released on Feb 16, a day after being imprisoned over her report of the funeral of an intelligence officer killed in Libya. The Coalition For Women In Journalism (CFWIJ) welcomes Hülya’s release. However, we denounce the prison sentence of the appeal court, which upheld the imprisonment given to Hülya and other journalists for their coverage.
Hülya was released a day later of her imprisonment on February 16. The journalist was convicted for three years and nine months in prison over the reportage of the deaths of Turkish intelligence officers in Libya in 2020. She was tried along with her colleagues Barış Pehlivan, Barış Terkoğlu, Murat Ağırel, Aydın Keser and Ferhat Çelik in the same case for revealing information about Turkish intelligence service officials and remained behind bars for six months of detention.
The charges related to journalists’ social media posts and reports published after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s statement of the death of a few Turkish intelligence officers in Libya in 2020, calling them ‘several martyrs’. Turkey provided intelligence service and military training to Libya's Government of National Accord and supported the country for the assault of eastern Libyan forces led by Khalifa Haftar in Tripoli.
Hülya was sentenced to three months and nine months in prison for ‘publishing, disseminating and disclosing information regarding the identities, duties, and activities of the members of the National Intelligence Organization and their families’ in September 2020.
All journalists who were prosecuted in the same case against Hülya, denied the accusations and defended themselves that they did their job as journalists but their sentences were finalized after the appeals court of İstanbul rejected their application on January 28, 2022.
Hülya was arrested on February 15 from her home in Manisa. Following her health check, she was sent to an E-type closed prison in the city.
The Coalition For Women In Journalism welcomes the release of Hülya. She was the second woman journalist who was imprisoned in 2022. There are still four women journalists who remain behind bars over their journalistic activities. We are utterly dismayed by the Turkish state’s intimidation policies against journalists. We urge Turkish authorities to end harassing journalists legally and provide a free environment for them to do their job. Journalism is not a crime.
The Coalition For Women In Journalism is a global organization of support for women journalists. The CFWIJ pioneered mentorship for mid-career women journalists across several countries around the world and is the first organization to focus on the status of free press for women journalists. We thoroughly document cases of any form of abuse against women in any part of the globe. Our system of individuals and organizations brings together the experience and mentorship necessary to help female career journalists navigate the industry. Our goal is to help develop a strong mechanism where women journalists can work safely and thrive.
If you have been harassed or abused in any way, and please report the incident by using the following form.