From: Guven.Guzeldere%STANFORD.BitNet@pucc.PRINCETON.EDU (hq.ggg)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.turkish
Subject: Turks mourn journalist
Date: 26 Jan 93 21:24:53 GMT
Reply-To: Turkish Cultural Program List <TRKNWS-L%USCVM.BitNet@pucc.PRINCETON.EDU>
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

Reuter :  01/25 2033  TURKS MOURN MURDERED JOURNALIST



    By Metin Demirsar

    ISTANBUL, Jan 26, Reuter - Thousands of mourners chanting anti-Iranian

slogans marched through Istanbul on Monday night to protest against the killing

of prominent Turkish journalist Ugur Mumcu.

    Mumcu, a staunch critic of militant Islam, was killed by a car bomb in

Ankara on Sunday.

    Police said 10,000 people, including journalists, lawyers and human rights

activists marched through Istanbul to the Cumhuriyet newspaper where Mumcu had

been an investigative reporter and an editorial writer.

    As the mourners marched past the Iranian consulate, they shouted: "Here is

the Sharia (Islamic law). Here are the murderers. Islamic fundamentalists to

Iran."

    Three Islamic organisations are among those which have claimed

responsibility for the bombing, police said.

    Earlier, Mumcu's colleagues lit candles at the Iranian consulate to protest

at the killing.

    In the western city of Izmir, thousands of people shouted anti-Iranian

slogans during a peaceful march to denounce the killing, Anatolian news agency

said.

    Turkish newspapers condemned the murder, saying it threatened to undermine

the country's fragile democracy.

    Mumcu, 51, was blown apart by a bomb which exploded when he switched on the

ignition of his car outside his apartment building in the capital's wealthy

Gaziosmanpasa district.

    His work gained him the enmity of Islamic radicals, Kurdish militants, drug

barons and criminal bosses.

    Police said the high-powered bomb was similar to ones used to kill an

Israeli diplomat in March 1992 and an American computer specialist in Ankara in

October 1991.

    The pro-Iranian Islamic Jihad claimed to have carried out both those

attacks.

    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."

 REUTER PRM EM GD



Reuter : 01/26 0911  TURKS PROTEST AT MUMCU MURDER, FOREIGNERS HELD



    By Alistair Lyon

    ANKARA, Jan 26, Reuter - Thousands of Turks angered by the murder of leading

leftwing journalist Ugur Mumcu marched through Ankara, Istanbul and other cities

on Tuesday, witnesses said.

    Mumcu was killed by a bomb planted under his car on Sunday in an attack

claimed by three Islamic fundamentalist groups.

    Up to 20,000 people gathered outside the Istanbul offices of Cumhuriyet

newspaper, for which Mumcu had worked, and marched towards the Galata Bridge

over the Golden Horn waterway.

    Riot police prevented the crowd from crossing the bridge on their way to

Istanbul's main Taksim square. Earlier the marchers sat outside the Iranian

consulate and sang the national anthem.

    Cumhuriyet editor Ozgen Acar pointed the finger at Tehran. "Those who signed

the death warrant of (British author) Salman Rushdie yesterday killed Ugur Mumcu

today," he told the crowd.

    In Ankara, more than 3,000 people gathered outside Mumcu's home in a wealthy

neighbourhood and marched to Cumhuriyet's city-centre offices, witnesses said.

    "Turkey will not be Iran," demonstrators chanted in both cities. "Mullahs

out. Down with Sharia (Islamic law).

    Interior Minister Ismet Sezgin said police had detained 11 people of Middle

Eastern origin for questioning.

    A security official quoted by Anatolian news agency said police had also

detained 16 members of militant Moslem groups in Istanbul and seized some arms

and plastic explosives.

    "The existence of a foreign finger is weighing in this case," Sezgin told

reporters.

    Asked if visiting Iranian Interior Minister Abdollah Nouri had been asked to

provide information on Islamic organisations, Sezgin said: "They are helping us

on this issue."

    Sezgin said he would offer the "biggest reward in the history of Turkish

 {security" for information on the case.

    The security official said the detainees inqluded four Iranians found in

hotels in Ankara's central Ulus district.

    A Syrian was also detained near the house of a Turkish state security court

prosecutor, the official said.

    He said police had no clear leads.

    Mumcu, 51, a stern critic of radical Islam, also earned the hostility of

Kurdish militants, drug barons and criminal bosses for his investigative

writing.

 REUTER AL JP












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