Turkish court releases two suspects in Hrant Dink murder case

An Istanbul court on Feb. 13 ruled to release two suspects from the gendarmerie in the Black Sea province of Trabzon in the case into the killing of Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in 2007.

The two who have been identified as being released after filing appeals are gendarmerie intelligence officer Veysel Şahin and Okan Şimşek, Hurriyet Daily News reported citing state-run Anadolu Agency.

Şimşek’s lawyer, Mehmet Tahsin Soner, had appealed the Istanbul 14th Heavy Penal Court’s Feb. 2 ruling that ordered his continued imprisonment.

The court on Feb. 13 acknowledged that both Şimşek and Şahin had known of a plot to kill Dink in the year before the assassination occurred. However, it ordered their release on the grounds that they communicated the information in a timely manner and had already spent enough time in jail.

As a condition of their release, Şahin and Şimşek are both legally bound to check in at the nearest the police station weekly and are forbidden to travel abroad under a judicial control order.

Hrant Dink, the editor-in-chief of the Istanbul-based Armenian weekly Agos, was shot dead at the age of 52 in broad daylight outside his office in central Istanbul on Jan. 19, 2007.