Support for Suat Toktaş this time from pro-government media: 'I have opposed every journalist being arrested'

The arrest of Halk TV Editor-in-Chief Suat Toktaş as part of an expert witness investigation has caused a wide stir in the media world. While journalists and press freedom advocates have reacted to the decision, Hürriyet columnist Hande Fırat, who is close to the government, also expressed her support for Toktaş.

Stating that she worked with Toktaş for many years, Fırat emphasized that he is a moral and honest journalist committed to professional principles, saying, "I have always opposed the detention and arrest of journalists simply for doing their jobs. I will continue to maintain this stance."

Fırat wrote the following:

"Suat Toktaş is a journalist!

'To ask, one must first learn,' says Goethe... That is, of course, if you want questions to be asked, reasoning to take place, and the truth to emerge. While we, journalists who have passed fifty and did not arrive by parachute, were waiting on stairs and sidewalks, trying to intervene and ask the questions that absolutely needed to be asked, we were raised by our seniors with values that no longer quite fit today's world. The number of people I am talking about is not that high anymore. At least among those of us who are actively working.

- Morality, honesty, verifying news from at least two sources...

- That news is a team effort and that the main pillars of institutions are reporters, cameramen, and photojournalists...

- That the press sector has always been the area in the world where freedom of expression is most broadly exercised...

- That success belongs to the employees, and that failure and mistakes are taken on by the manager whose duty is to protect their employees...

- Along with all of this, the reality that we cannot commit crimes by hiding behind journalism...

- Our seniors taught us these things. I have always opposed the detention and arrest of journalists simply because they were doing their jobs, and I will continue to do so. When it comes to Suat Toktaş, I will not pass without saying a few words. Suat and I have 15 years of working together from BRT to CNN Türk... Suat is a moral and honest journalist who has worked in many media organizations from ATV to BRT, CNN Türk, and Halk TV, and who does not eat the rights of those working alongside him, nor does he let others do so. Hoping he returns to us as soon as possible..."