German journalist Meşale Tolu has been acquitted of terror charges by an Istanbul court. “After 4 years, 8 months and 20 days: acquitted on both counts!” Tolu wrote on Twitter. The Ulm-born journalist was accused, among other things, of membership in the left-wing extremist Marxist-Leninist Communist Party (MLKP) and terrorist propaganda. The MLCP is considered a terrorist organization in Turkey.
Her husband Suat Çorlu, who was also accused, was also acquitted, as the managing director of the organization “Reporters Without Borders”, Christian Mihr, who was on site as a trial observer in Istanbul, tweeted.
Tolu was arrested in Istanbul at the end of April 2017 and then detained for more than seven months. The journalist with Kurdish roots had worked in Turkey for the news agency Etha, among others. The trial against her began in October 2017, and around two months later Tolu was conditionally released from custody. In August 2018, after the ban on leaving the country was lifted, she was allowed to return to her home country of Germany.
During the course of the trial, the public prosecutor’s office had also asked for Tolu to be acquitted of all charges. For her husband Çorlu and other defendants, however, she had demanded a conviction for terrorist propaganda.