Associated Press in Ankara
The Guardian
A prosecutor is investigating whether to press charges against the Turkish publisher of a bestselling book by atheist writer Richard Dawkins for inciting religious hatred, reports said yesterday.
Publisher Erol Karaaslan said yesterday that he would be questioned by an Istanbul prosecutor as part of an official investigation into The God Delusion, written by the British expert in evolutionary biology.
Karaaslan could go on trial if the prosecutor concludes the book incites religious hatred and insults religious values, and faces up to one year in prison if found guilty, Milliyet newspaper reported.
The prosecutor started the inquiry into the book after one reader complained that passages in the book were an assault on "sacred values", Karaaslan said.
The publisher said he would be questioned today and faces prosecution both as the book's publisher and translator. The book has sold 6,000 copies in Turkey since it was published by his Kuzey publishing house in June.
No one was available for comment at the prosecutor's office.
The investigation follows controversy about free speech in Turkey after Nobel prizewinning author Orhan Pamuk went on trial in 2005 over comments about the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in the early 20th century. The charges were later dropped.
The EU, which Turkey hopes to join, is pressing Ankara to change laws that curb free expression and do not fit within the bloc's standards of free speech. Turkey has said it will soften a law which makes it a crime to denigrate Turkish identity or insult the country's institutions.
The Guardian
A prosecutor is investigating whether to press charges against the Turkish publisher of a bestselling book by atheist writer Richard Dawkins for inciting religious hatred, reports said yesterday.
Publisher Erol Karaaslan said yesterday that he would be questioned by an Istanbul prosecutor as part of an official investigation into The God Delusion, written by the British expert in evolutionary biology.
Karaaslan could go on trial if the prosecutor concludes the book incites religious hatred and insults religious values, and faces up to one year in prison if found guilty, Milliyet newspaper reported.
The prosecutor started the inquiry into the book after one reader complained that passages in the book were an assault on "sacred values", Karaaslan said.
The publisher said he would be questioned today and faces prosecution both as the book's publisher and translator. The book has sold 6,000 copies in Turkey since it was published by his Kuzey publishing house in June.
No one was available for comment at the prosecutor's office.
The investigation follows controversy about free speech in Turkey after Nobel prizewinning author Orhan Pamuk went on trial in 2005 over comments about the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in the early 20th century. The charges were later dropped.
The EU, which Turkey hopes to join, is pressing Ankara to change laws that curb free expression and do not fit within the bloc's standards of free speech. Turkey has said it will soften a law which makes it a crime to denigrate Turkish identity or insult the country's institutions.
Pour ceux qui doutaient que la Turquie soit prête à rejoindre l'Union Européenne, voilà qui mettra un point final à leurs doutes. Maintenant ils en sont sûrs!
