4. Minorities’ Own Media
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The superficial impression one gets after reading the law (see section 3) is that the licensing is open to anyone who fulfills the necessary standards: technological infrastructure, financial viability, experience and special knowledge of the media flow managers, quality of the program, respect of the journalistic code of ethics [Ibid., 7 - 9, 19 - 20]. However, taking under consideration the required standards, one can realize how difficult might be for a minority, with limited resources (including human resources) to fulfill them. The fact that Greek media law has no provision for partial state subsidization of independent minority media and use of the public broadcasting infrastructure for the production of independent minority programs, makes it even more, practically difficult for minority groups to have their own share into the Greek media spectrum.
Formally, the Greek state would argue that: : Paragraph 1: Paragraph 1: Paragraph 1persons belonging to national minorities have free access to the media; and that the right to impart and receive information is based on generally binding laws. It would then mention a score of publications in Turkish, published in Thrace. It may even add that the regional Thrace outlet of the national state radio has Turkish-language news bulletins and a couple of radio programs in Turkish.
Reality is as usual very different. Turkish-language media do exist but in smaller numbers. Only two or three newspapers are published at most once a week and, even those, with occasional longer breaks. State radio programs in Turkish are of cultural content and the newscasts are exact translations of the Greek newscasts. So minority community news cannot be broadcasted neither from the private Turkish language radio stations, that are not allowed to have newscasts.
Besides the Turkish language papers, there is a Catholic fortnightly, a publication (in Greek and Macedonian) of the Macedonian minority published occasionally, and hafl a dozen newspapers catering some immigrant communities in their own languages.
Moreover, there are 6 Turkish language stations in Thrace and two Evangelical radio stations in Larisa and in Athens. Like all private radio stations, they are operating without license as the license system installed in 1989 has never been implemented. Nevertheless, the –hence formally illegal- minority radio stations are occasionally selected by police and the courts for legal actions against them, quite unlike the unhindered functioning of the other, majority –and equally illegal-, radio stations.
Recurrent convictions for articles in minority newspapers make their publishers very cautious as to their content. References to possible human rights violations and discrimination against a minority can lead to prosecution.
In 1974, Selahedin Galip was convicted for dissemination of false information (Article 191) and subsequently stripped of his citizenship (on the basis or Article 19 and then Article 20 of the Code of Citizenship).
Salih Halil, publisher of the minority newspaper “Ileri” has been repeatedly prosecuted between 1975-9. First, for having used the Turkish name of Komotini (Gumulcine) –acquitted. Then, for having published in Turkish a 1914 editorial of well-known writer Spyros Melas critical of Greek gendarmerie –convicted to seven months by both first and appeals courts. Or for having alleged injustices again minority citizens –convicted to seven months (of which he served 72 days) by first, appeals and supreme courts. Likewise, for having criticized land expropriations to create a university –convicted to three months at first instance and served 35 days until acquitted by the appeals court. Finally, for having issued a tract opposing the participation of minority shopkeepers to a strike –convicted along with communal leader Ibram Onsunoglu to seven months at first instance and acquitted by the appeals court.
Abdulhalim Dede, one-time correspondent of Istanbul-based “Hurryet,” occasional publisher of the minority newspaper “Trakyanin Sesi” and owner of “Radio Isik,” has also been repeatedly prosecuted between 1985-1998. First, for dissemination of false information in Hurryet –convicted to 13 months at first instance, crime prescribed before reaching the appeals court. For satirical sketches –convicted to ten months at first instance, acquitted by the appeals court. For dissemination of false information and defamation of an ultra-nationalist activist from Thrace, through an article denouncing the “shadow state” in Thrace –acquitted for the first charge and convicted to a six-month suspended sentence for the second. For trying to install a radio antenna for “Radio Isik” in his back yard –convicted to eight months in prison. While two cases are pending for illegally operating radio stations. Over three thousand radio stations operate in Greece without licenses, several of which have also installed antennae without permission and without been prosecuted.
The late former minority parliamentarian Sadik Ahmet had been prosecuted not only for calling the minority Turkish but also for expressing his opinion on the minority’s human rights problems in his newspaper or his political publications.
Macedonians’ freedom of expression in their own language and/or about possible human rights issues has been prosecuted too. Two Macedonian activists, Christos Sideropoulos and Tasos Boulis, were convicted in Athens, on 1/4/1993, of “disseminating false information and atempting to incite citizens to commit acts of violence upon each other” (Article 191 of the Penal Code) for having declared in an interview to the weekly magazine “Ena” (issue of March 1992) that they feel Macedonian and that there is a Macedonian minority in Greece. They were sentenced to five months in prison and 100,000 drs. (then about $440) fine and were set free on appeal. The appeal court in Athens, on 28/1/1994, dropped the charges because an amnesty clause in law 2172/16-12-1993 prescribed all crimes by the press still pending at the penal or civil courts.
Christos Sideropoulos participated in the CSCE meeting in Copenhagen in 1990 and reported there about human rights violations against ethnic Macedonians in Greece, referring to himself as “Macedonian”. In 1994, he was charged with violating article 191.1 of the Greek Criminal Code for “disseminating false information, which can cause disruption of the international relations of Greece. Greek Helsinki Monitor observed the trial of Christos Sideropoulos and concluded that there were significant contradictions with the indictment and the newspaper article on which it was said to be based. Greek Helsinki Monitor also noted that the prosecution was actually based on a document classified as secret by the Greek Foreign Ministry and which was not made available to the defendant. This fact, according to Greek Helsinki Monitor, watered down the attempts of the Greek government to distance itself from the prosecution by claiming that it was an act of the independent judiciary, the opinions of which were not necessarily identical with those of the government. Moreover, the prosecution against Sideropoulos should have been legally inadmissible because Article 6 of the Greek Penal Code states that a Greek citizen can be prosecuted for a criminal act committed in a foreign country only if this act is punishable under the laws of that country, or there is “an application from the government of the country wherein the misdemeanor was committed”. In addition, Sideropoulos’ right to legal defense was curtailed due to the denial of lawyers in Florina to take up his defense. Eventually, in 1995, the charges were dropped as inadmissible on the basis of Article 6.
On 19/11/1998, Traianos Pasois was tried in Florina for “dissemination of false information” (article 191 of the Penal Code) in the Greek-Macedonian border in Niki, Florina on 17/2/1996. At that time he was a leading member of “Rainbow.” According to the indictment, he was carrying “two wall calendars which he intended to circulate” and which “featured photographs of pure Greek towns and areas, under or next to which were captions written in a foreign idiom.” Indeed, the names of the localities were written in Macedonian. The indictment further stated that the captions “praised clearly controversial and provocative actions and decisions by political parties, groups and organizations which took part in the civil war. [These] actions and decisions disputed the Greek character of [the province of] Macedonia, aiming at its dismemberment, secession and annexation by a neighboring state then enemy of Greece”. The party implied here was the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) which was illegal during the civil war but is legal today. There was no evidence in the indictment to suggest that the calendars contained any advocacy of violence. Pasois was eventually acquitted.
In mid-1990s, there were credible reports that the postal distribution of Macedonian minority publications “Zora” and “Moglena” was obstructed by postal authorities.
