Turkey’s Culture and Tourism Minister Ertugrul Gunay considered a perilous development the court verdict that was reached in the murder trial of Hrant Dink, the founder and former chief editor of Istanbul’s Agos Armenian weekly, who was killed in 2007.   

Gunay noted that the ruling, whereby all defendants were acquitted of being members of an organized faction, was a perilous development. “I believe the ruling will be appealed. We are following the case carefully,” the Minister said, Haberaktuel of Turkey informs.    

To note, on Tuesday, the Turkish court found Yasin Hayal guilty of planning and organizing Hrant Dink’s murder, and sentenced him to life in prison. Erhan Tuncel, on the other hand, was found not guilty of prompting Dink’s murder, and, instead, he was sentenced to 10 years and 6 months for an explosion in a Mc Donald’s store. But taking into account that Tuncel was already incarcerated for that amount of time, the court ruled that he be set free.  

And earlier, Hrant Dink’s killer, Ogun Samast, was sentenced to a total of 22 years and 10 months for Dink’s murder and for bearing illegal arms. But Samast was tried at a juvenile court, since he was a minor at the time of the murder.