Interior Minister İdris Naim Şahin has said nine security officials were given administrative punishments for negligence in failing to prevent the 2007 murder of Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink, Today’s Zaman reported.
Responding to parliamentary questions from Turgut Dibek, a deputy from the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), about Dink's murder, Şahin said five officials were sentenced to forfeiture of monthly salary, three were given motions of censure and one was given a warning. He said no investigation was allowed for eight officials, prosecution was decided against for 31 and two were acquitted by a court.
Dink, the late editor-in-chief of Agos, was shot dead by an ultranationalist teenager outside the offices of his newspaper in broad daylight in Istanbul on Jan. 19, 2007. A juvenile court sentenced Dink's assassin, Ogün Samast, to 22 years and 10 months in jail last July. He was 17 when the killing took place.
In January, an Istanbul court sentenced one man to life in prison for involvement in Dink's murder but acquitted 17 other defendants, sparking large protests and criticism from rights groups and angering lawyers who said the trial failed to clarify whether there were connections between the suspects and state officials.
A report commissioned by the Turkish president found negligence by Turkish state officials in the killing of Dink.
Security officials failed to protect Dink despite warnings of a plot to kill him, and the subsequent trial exposed widespread structural problems in the legal system and the need for reforms, the report said.
The report also revealed that the flawed murder investigation undermined public trust in the security services.
