Agca 'writing a new Bible'
ISTANBUL: Mehmet Ali Agca, the man who tried to kill pope John Paul
II, was "writing a new bible" when he was rearrested on Friday
under government "threats and pressure", his brother said yesterday
as he led a protest outside the prison holding him.
"Is justice a toy of the media?" asked one of the placards Adnan
Agca and a group of supporters waved outside the Kartal prison,
where the former right-wing hitman was taken Friday night after
just eight days of freedom.
Agca's release was widely criticised by the media, which yesterday
was near unanimous in hailing the decision to send him back to
jail.
Agca was freed on January 12 after 19 years in Italian prisons for
his attempt on John Paul II's life and five and a half in Turkish
prisons for an earlier murder and two robberies.
His early release based on sentence reductions and amendments to
the penal code was overturned by the High Court of Appeals, acting
under instructions from the justice ministry, which said his jail
time had been miscalculated.
"Judges and prosecutors are under heavy threats and pressure,"
Adnan Agca told reporters outside the prison. "They are under
pressure from their own ministry.
"The Turkish people will never allow Mehmet Ali Agca to die in
jail," he said.
"The Vatican has proclaimed my brother the messiah. My brother is
the messiah, he is the mahdi (the Muslim messiah).
"Believe it or not, he has dedicated his life and his ideal to his
country and to his nation," Adnan Agca said, adding that his
brother's attorney would take legal action against the Appeals
Court decision.
Lawyer Mustafa Demirbag told the NTV news channel that he would
also file a formal complaint against Justice Minister Cemil Cicek,
who ordered the review.
The Supreme Court's decision to return Agca to prison shows the
country's legal system works and is able to correct its errors,
Cicek said yesterday.
"My brother was very happy to have been set free," Adnan Agca said.
"He was not expecting this decision. He was writing a new
Bible."
Some angry, some jubilant, Turkish newspapers agreed that Agca's
return to jail was a good thing.
"Back where he belongs," headlined the liberal Milliyet, whose
emblematic editor Abdi Ipekci was murdered by Agca in 1979, two
years before he shot and wounded John Paul II in Rome's St Peter's
Square.
"Scandal in spades", bannered the popular Aksam.
The miscalculation of sentence reductions made Turkey "the laughing
stock of the world", Aksam wrote, "and to boot, we gave the killer
centrestage." "Eight days of vacation, eight more years in jail,"
headlined the popular Vatan; "Forward, march - back to the hole,"
was the banner in the mass selling Hurriyet, while the liberal
Radikal wrote: "Killer fails to flee."
Agca, who fled a Turkish prison while awaiting trial for the Ipekci
murder and resurfaced, gun in hand, outside the Vatican on May 13,
1981, was pardoned by Italy in 2000 and extradited to Turkey.
