From: Guven.Guzeldere%STANFORD.BitNet@pucc.PRINCETON.EDU (hq.ggg)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.turkish
Subject: Reaction to Mumcu Death
Date: 25 Jan 1993 22:21:18 -0600
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
Reply-To: Turkish Cultural Program List <TRKNWS-L%USCVM.BitNet@pucc.PRINCETON.EDU>
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

01/25 1549  TURKS LEAD PROTEST MARCHES AGAINST ISLAMIC
FUNDAMENTALISTS

ANKARA (JAN. 25) DPA - A day after one of Turkey's most
respected journalists, Ugur Mumcu, was killed by a car bomb,
thousands of Turks Monday took part in protest marches
against Islamic fundamentalism.
   The marches took place in several cities. In Istanbul,
10,000 protesters filed through the Cagaloglu press district
to the offices of Cumhuriyet, the liberal newspaper which
employed Mumcu since 1975.
   As the procession passed the Iranian consulate,
demonstrators shouted: "Fundamentalists to Iran,
fundamentalism be damned." They also called on security
services to show the killers "no mercy".
   Four Islamic organisations - most prominent among them
the "Islamic Jihad" organisation - had claimed
responsibility for Sunday's killing, investigators said.
   Mumcu, 50, noted for his investigative reporting about
terrorist organisations and organised crime, was killed when
he got into his car in Ankara and turned the key in the
ignition, detonating a powerful blast which blew the vehicle
to bits.
   Mumcu, chief columnist for Cumhuriyet, gained an
international reputation with his reporting on the
background of the assassination attempt against Pope John
Paul II in 1981, on the rise of radical Islamic
fundamentalistm and on organised crime in Turkey.

01/25 1325  TURKISH JOURNALIST MUMCU REPORTEDLY RECEIVED ...

ANKARA, TURKEY (JAN. 25) UPI - Turkish journalist Ugur
Mumcu, who was killed  in a car bomb explosion in Ankara,
received warnings and threats from at least one outlawed
group before the assassination, the Istanbul newspaper Sabah
said Monday.
   Mumcu, 51, an investigative reporter and columnist for
the Istanbul newspaper Cumhuriyet, died outside his home in
Ankara's affluent Cankaya district Sunday afternoon when a
bomb planted in his car exploded after he got in.
   A little-known group calling itself the Islamic
Liberation Organization claimed responsibility but gave no
reason for killing him.
   Sabah quoted Mumcu's wife as saying he had received
threats and warnings before the murder, apparently from the
outlawed Kurdistan Worker's Party, or PKK, which has been
attacking the security forces in southeastern Turkey since
1984.
   Cumhuriyet said Mumcu was about to visit a friend Sunday,
and went outside to check his car before his family joined
him. Witnesses said he died when a massive explosion rocked
the vehicle after he got in.
   It was not immediately clear whether the blast occurred
when he switched on the ignition. His body was found about
one yard (meter) from the smouldering wreck.
   Turkey's leading newspapers expressed disgust at the
killing, and some commentators raised questions about how an
apparently large explosive device could have been planted in
Mumcu's car without anyone in the neighborhood noticing.
   Cumhuriyet said Mumcu was supposed to have a special
police guard outside his home, under a government plan which
provided state protection to all of Turkey's leading
journalists.
   Mumcu also lived in a neighborhood in Cankaya where a
number of embassies and the homes of important people were
located, and there were supposed to be several policemen
around at all times, the newspaper said.
   The PKK, which had threatened Mumcu several times, did
not claim responsibility for the assassination, but an
anonymous caller claiming he spoke for the rebel group told
the newspaper: "Mumcu has been silenced."
   In several of his columns and in TV panel discussions
before he died, Mumcu had warned repeatedly that terrorism
was on the rise in Turkey, and that an increasing number of
Islamic fundamentalist groups were being set up.
   Mumcu, who was the author of five books, extensively
investigated the background of Mehmet Ali Agca, an Islamic
fundamentalist, who attempted to assassinate the Pope in May
1981.
   Deputy Prime Minister Erdal Inonu, commenting on the
murder, said Islamic fundamentalist groups were trying to
pressure the government into introducing the Islamic Sharia
law in the country.
   Under the constitution, Turkey is a secular state, though
99 percent of its population is Muslim.
   Mumcu was the 15th journalist to be killed in Turkey in
about one year. In Athens, journalists in a Greek-Turkish
friendship group expressed disgust and concern about the
murder.

    The International Press Institute on Monday sent a
message to Turkish Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel
condemning Mumcu's killing.
    The IPI, which groups leading journalists, editors and
publishers throughout the world, said: "The brutal murder of
this highly-respected and important commentator is deeply
shocking."
    The message, released by the IPI's London secretariat,
said the institute "strongly urges that every possible
effort be made by your (Demirel's) authorities to bring the
perpetrators of this terrible crime to justice without
delay."