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Former Turkish DMOZ Editor Draws 10 Months In Jail

Posted by timothy on from the freedom-of-whatnow? dept.

makne writes "H. Ertas, a Turkish editor of the Open Directory Project (www.dmoz.org) has been sentenced to 10 months in prison after being found guilty of editing a category about the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK). Ertas's lawyer, Suna Coskun, explained that his client had worked as a voluntary editor at the Open Directory Project during his studies at the Euphrat-University and had been responsible for the Kurdish category. At the same time he became interested in Kurds and undertook his own research into the subject. As a voluntary editor, he had sorted the directory submissions but could not be responsible for their content. Therefore there could be no penalty under international law, according to Coskun. His activities could in no way be understood as 'support for a terrorist organisation' and thus Ertas' release was appropriate. The court sentenced Ertas to 10 months in prison and a fine of 416 million Turkish lire ($293). The sentence is not eligible for probation." (Read on for more.) By email, makne writes "I don't know the editor personally, but the editor was first arrested two years ago, then released on parole until now. Members of the editor community have tried to help him in any way they can, with no apparent success. The editor resigned from the ODP in 2002."

Makne also provided this link to a summary (from the Kurdish point of view) of earlier attempts to stifle Kurdish sites, including a campaign to have DMOZ's then-parent company Netscape remove the Kurdish category from DMOZ.

11 of 666 comments (clear)

  1. Protest by dhart · · Score: 5, Insightful


    I believe that organizations like DMOZ should have the ability to quickly react, perhaps in protest, to situations like this one.

    For example, rigorous semantic information attached to every DMOZ record would allow the DMOZ community to suspend or flag all information related to the Turkish government, in protest of the current situation. Such a capability could easily be abused or taken too far, which is why it should be reserved only for situations which have direct effect on the organization (and/or its editors, in the case of DMOZ).

    With enough open (as in speech) organizations touching enough people in the world, both major and minor misbehavior by governments around the would could be brought to light in this way.

    1. Re:Protest by henleg · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Is it the political information about the kurds that the turkish government wants to remove from DMOZ, or is it about kurds in general? When reading these things, I feel reluctant to have Turkey joining the European Union. They simply have to get better, and it will be very interesting to see if the turkish government can do this before the set deadline.

    2. Re:Protest by G.+W.+Bush+Junior · · Score: 5, Insightful
      That's what I thought, but keep in mind that in another EU country you can get arrested for publicly supporting certain political parties. Namely, in Germany it's against the law to be part of certain neo-nazi ideologies and holocaust denial. And in fact, I'm not sure I'm opposed to that eevn though it's certainly a limitation of my right of free speech. But then, what gives me the right to tell the Turkish government which ideologies are "dangerous". I guess that's why this kind of legislation is never a good idea in the first place.

      Since you bring up up germany; do you sincerely beleive that a law designed to stop antisemitic propaganda is just as bad as a law that, say, limits the civil liberties of an ethnic minority like jews (or kurds for that matter).

      Kurds are an ethnic minority, like jews were in nazi germany - a Kurd cannot decide to stop being a kurd, no less than I can stop being a caucasean.

      On another note I fail to see how the german laws you cite are any more stifling to free speech than laws prohibiting libel. Neonazism is tightly coupled to malicious defamation of jews - according to the laws of most countries that constitutes libel. Mentioning neonazism explicitly in the law just serves to simplify libel lawsuits.

      Or do you beleive that libel laws in america are morally equivalent to limiting the civil liberties of an ethnic minority?

      --
      "I don't know that Atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots." -George H.W. Bush
    3. Re:Protest by artson · · Score: 5, Informative
      "I believe that organizations like DMOZ should have the ability to quickly react, perhaps in protest, to situations like this one."

      They do have the ability and they did react quickly, however to no avail apparently. There was great discussion inside DMOZ about this situation and editors made many suggestions, but in the end it comes down to this: the Open Directory Project's aim is to disseminate information, not to use that information for specific purposes. Initially IIRC, the category was sequestered while possible options were examined, but in the end, to paraphrase some slash-dotter, information wants to be free.

      The Turkish government may be malign, but they aren't stupid and they understood that Ertas' collection of data did have an effect. In some ways, editors function like good journalists; they don't create news, but they find it and highlight it in categories which they create and place in the larger structure of the Directory. This makes the data accessible to more people who don't have to search the whole 'net for it. Creating a category makes a statement if you think about it. It says that the information in this category is worthy of consideration because somebody has organized the data in a way which emphasizes its significance in ways which the viewer may not have imagined were it not for the efforts of the editor.

      Editors are encouraged in their efforts to make novel and interesting collections of web sites and to lodge them within the greater structure of the Directory. It's one of the things that makes the Open Directory Project great and hugely useful.

      For more information on this subject, go to the Open Directory and type kurds into the search box. Failing that, here are some relevant DMOZ categories: Ethnicity Kurdish, History, Kurdistan or Kurdish Human Rights. See also this category Descriptiont

      --
      In times of trouble, the smell of frying onions usually gives confidence and comfort.
  2. This is where wikipedia may have problems too by Saven+Marek · · Score: 5, Insightful

    This is could be an example of the kind, of political pressure that will make things like say wikipedia less and less of a good thing.

    For example the slashdot article in the last months, where there were misinformous facts inserted. How many of these can pile up over time? If a country is suppressing all knowledge of what it really has done, and tying in information on what it wants to be seen as happening then the slow blend from one information into a misinformation can be complete.

    And these are self referencing things, too, so, you find wikipedia and dmoz links and maybe some other online encyclopedias all combined together with misinformation.

    How will one in the end sort it out?

    The nets biggest online nude anime gallery's

  3. Re:Guys please! by ortcutt · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That's not the issue though. Nobody is defending the PKK. The question is whether organizing the categories of links on a web directory make someone a criminal. Putting H. Ertas in prison for 10 months for organizing categories of links on a website isn't right and it doesn't help fight terrorism.

  4. Happens all to frequently around the world by karlmiller · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The unfortunate thing is that this kind of action happens all to frequently everyday in countries around the world, where individuals say things that threaten people in power. What's worse is that similar activities are occuring in the United States, which is supposed to be the land that may not occur in.


    Remember, Freedom can't protect itself.

  5. My grandfather was an IRA terrorist by Magickcat · · Score: 5, Interesting

    My grandfather was an I.R.A. terrorist who fought in the Irish War of Independence (1919-21). The Catholic Church excommunicated him for his allegianaces too. Oh and he certainly killed plenty of Black and Tans.

    Oh, but then the I.R.A. won the war, and he got a medal and a soldier's war pension, and the Catholic Church reinstated him. He never bothered with the Church again or with collecting his pension.

    Today's terrorist could be tommorow's war hero. The British government even today would have you think that my grandfather was a terrorist, but the Irish nation is living proof that it isn't always so clear cut. It's terribly important that people decide for themselves who are the terrorists and who are not. Governments that think that they can decide for their citizens are merely tyrants, and tyrants often fall when they become intolerable.

    --

    Si tacuisses philosophus mansisses. If you had kept quiet, you would have remained a philosopher.

  6. Women and children by Animaether · · Score: 5, Insightful

    obligatory "I'll get flamed for this" statement aside...

    What's with the age-old "they killed women and children" stuff ?
    In war and terror, women and children *kill*.
    In war and terror, women and children get killed.

    If I were an Israeli borderguard and a woman strapped with explosives runs towards me, I would... kill them.

    If I were a Sudan military or somesuch and a rebel child points an AK47 at me ready to fire, I would... shoot them in the legs, hopefully, but good chance I'd aim for the chest due to the larger surface area and it'd probably... kill them.

    These particular 'women and children' statements are hollow when put into perspective this way, in my opinion.

    Now you may not share that point of view, or you may point out that these are "innocent women and children". Perhaps or, in the case of terrorist attacks, likely so. But does that mean the men were not innocent ? Does it mean that the loss of their life is somehow not as disturbing/devastating as that of the women and children ?

    Just my thoughts...

  7. Re:Who Did What When How? by Saeger · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Just for fun, I've compiled a list of misc "terrorist" links myself:

    If jackboot thug out there wants to arrest me for "implicitly supporting" the content of any of these links, feel free to abuse the PATRIOT ACT in order to force slashdot.org to reveal the IP address associated with this post, and in turn my ISP will reveal my name and home address associated with the DHCP lease (because I didn't bother to post through an anonymous proxy(s)). tinfoil_hat_mode off.

    --

    --
    Power to the Peaceful
  8. Anonimity (Not entirely OT) by ACNiel · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "If you aren't doing anything wrong, you have no need for anonymity."

    Slashdot needs to start posting more of these articles from around the world. The less astute among us will still cling to their lack of sensibilities on this subject, but people must start to realize that people really are persecuted for unpopular opinions (Your terrorist is my freedom fighter).

    The more pervasive we make anonymity and cryptography everywhere, the easier it will be to protect people that need or deserve to be protected.