By Nanore Barsoumian
Armenian intellectual and entrepreneur Sevan Nisanyan,
60, could spend the next 25 years in a Turkish prison as punishment for a long
list of charges relating to construction violations stacked against him. As a
journalist and a critic of government policies, Nisanyan has been too loud and
too bold for an Armenian in Turkey. His friends have launched petitions calling
on the Turkish authorities to at least allow him his intellectual pursuits.
Armenian intellectual and entrepreneur Sevan Nisanyan,
60, could spend the next 25 years in a Turkish prison…
Held at a high-security prison, Nisanyan—recipient of the
2004 Freedom of Thought Award from Turkey’s Human Rights Association—has been
effectively silenced. For a man who thrives on writing, prodding, and researching,
his current situation must be suffocating. Aside from writing commentaries in
various newspapers, Nisanyan, a graduate of Columbia and Yale, has also
published a series of best-selling guidebooks to small hotels in Turkey, an
online toponymic index, as well as research on the old and new place names in
Turkey. A friend of his, Isin Onol, alerted the Armenian Weekly about his
condition.
“We started a petition for him… We don’t think it will
really help him gain back his freedom, but it might help make his condition
better, to be able to continue his intellectual activities until he is free
again,” she wrote. In less than 24 hours, the petition garnered around 4,000
signatures.
Initially serving two years at a low-security prison
where he could still devour books—and where he was even enthusiastic about
enriching the prison’s scrawny library—Nisanyan is currently condemned to a
life of intellectual deprivation in a high-security prison. The charges that
have him locked up for at least 16 years stem from the renovations and
additions to his hotels in Sirince, an old Greek village in Izmir that has
become a tourist destination thanks to Nisanyan and his rustic hotel business.
Additional charges could add another nine years to his prison term. Nisanyan may
not be eligible for parole until 2024.
Although appearing to be a direct consequence of his
construction activities, the charges have served another crucial purpose: They
have muzzled a man who has been unreservedly critical of state policies, the
assault on freedom of speech, and the state-imposed amnesia vis-à-vis the
Armenian Genocide.
But, never mind all that. His real crimes are graver: The
charges brought against him include illegally building a three-foot-wide stone
arch over the door of his chicken coop… (Yes, you read that right.)
“Nisanyan is currently the only person in Turkey who is
actually in jail under Law 2863, art. 65, which governs ‘unlicensed
construction in a historical heritage site’ and this, in a country where over
half of all construction is estimated to be illegal, and the presidential
palace, completed in 2014, was itself built without license on a listed
heritage site in defiance of a court injunction,” according to information on
his personal website.
Nisanyan once told the Weekly that at least 90 building
constructions were illegal in Sirince, which was declared a historic site in
1984. Authorities were required to produce a new zoning plan within a year to
allow legal constructions. They failed to do so until 23 years later. In the
meantime, it was impossible not to engage in construction, according to
Nisanyan. Still, he and his team of builders pulled apart ruined houses and
studied the work of earlier builders. It was a way for him to understand early
building traditions, which he summarized in a manual he prepared for others in
Sirince.
In 2011, Nisanyan donated his hotel-houses to the Nesin
Foundation, which aims to bring educational opportunities to children from
poverty stricken families.
Speaking about his hotels and the lawsuits against him,
Nisanyan once told the Weekly: “As far as I know, this is the first—and I think
only—commercial establishment in the history of the Turkish Republic that
carries an openly Armenian name.”
“The Armenian who openly defies the Turkish state is
something they cannot tolerate,” he added.
His defiance reached new heights in 2013, when he
criticized a proposed “hate crime” bill following the release of “The Innocence
of Muslims,” a film demeaning Prophet Muhammad, saying that the bill was an
assault on freedom of expression. “It is an almost kindergarten-level case of
what we call freedom of expression,” he wrote in a blog post. A few months
later, an Istanbul court sentenced him to 13 months in jail for “publicly
insulting the religious values of part of the population.” The case has since
been resting with the Court of Appeals.
‘The Armenian who openly defies the Turkish state is
something they cannot tolerate.’
Nisanyan is convinced the jail term is the price he is
paying for his “impertinence.” The homepage on his website stresses: “For
anyone familiar with the workings of the Turkish legal system, it is obvious
that the construction charges are a smokescreen, and Nisanyan is [being]
punished for his political and religious impertinence, made graver by the fact
that he is an ethnic Armenian.”
The truth is, Nisanyan simply could not live within the
boundaries set for him—especially the boundaries drawn for an Armenian. And
now, he is paying a hefty price for it…
To sign the petition, visit
https://www.change.org/p/free-sevan-nisanyan.
About Nanore Barsoumian (203 Articles)
Nanore Barsoumian is the editor of the Armenian Weekly.
Her writings focus on human rights, politics, poverty, environmental and gender
issues. She has reported from Armenia, Nagorno Karabagh, Javakhk, and Turkey.
She earned her B.A. degree in Political Science and English from the University
of Massachusetts (Boston). Email Nanore Barsoumian at writenanore@gmail.com, or
follow her on Twitter (@NanoreB).
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