Bekir Coşkun

Bekir Coşkun (Tülmen, Şanlıurfa, Turkey) is a Turkish journalist, writer and columnist for the leading Turkish daily, "Hürriyet". He is a good friend of Emin Çölaşan, who also used to work in the same newspaper before he was controversially sacked by the paper's editor-in-chief, Ertuğrul Özkök, for publishing a piece denouncing a jihadist publication following AKP's election victory on July 22, 2007. As staunch secularists, both are critical of the AKP.

Personal life

Bekir Coşkun was born in the Turkmen village of Tülmen in Şanlıurfa in the southeastern of the country.

His maternal grandmother was an Ottoman Armenian from Gümüşhane named Ümmühan. His grandfather had rescued her from a convoy of deportees and married her after his first wife died. [cite news|url=http://hurarsiv.hurriyet.com.tr/goster/haber.aspx?id=353092&yazarid=2
accessdate=2008-08-28
title=Ermeni meselem...
work=Hürriyet
first=Bekir
last=Coşkun
date=2005-09-27
language=Turkish
quote=O bir Ermeni kızıydı. Gerçek anneannemiz öldükten sonra dedem onu Fırat Havzası içinden Suriye'ye sevk edilen (tehcir), yer yer yok olan Ermeni kafileleri içinden alıp evlenmişti.] He learned about his grandmother's identity at the beginning of high school, though they never discussed the matter. [cite news|url=http://webarsiv.hurriyet.com.tr/2005/09/30/709428.asp
accessdate=2008-08-28
first=Sefa
last=Kaplan
title=Son yıllarda bu kadar müspet tepki almadım
work=Hürriyet
section=Gündem
date=2005-09-30
language=Turkish]

Controversies

* He has been several times accused of being elitist and alien to Turkish society by AKP suppoters. In an article written some weeks before the July 2007 General Elections, he described AKP electorates as "men who scratch their belly" ( _tr. göbeğini kaşıyan adamlar). [cite news|url=http://arama.hurriyet.com.tr/arsivnews.aspx?id=8701852
accessdate=2008-08-28
title=Başbakan ve göbeğini kaşıyan adam...
work=Hürriyet
date=2008-04-15
language=Turkish]

* He has had feuds Ertugrul Özkök, thinly accusing him of being servile to Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.Fact|date=August 2008 The same accusations were leveled by Çölaşan in much stronger terms in a book published after his dismissal from the newspaper.Fact|date=July 2008

* After Abdullah Gül's victory in the presidential elections of 2007, Coşkun stated, "he will not be my President", upon which the Prime Minister Erdoğan retorted by saying "he should abdicate his citizenship and leave the country if he doesn't consider [Gul] as his President". This lead to an outcry among supporters of secularism in the country that people who didn't share AKP's ideology would no longer be welcome in the country. [cite news|url=http://www.ntvmsnbc.com/news/417405.asp
accessdate=2008-08-28
title=Bekir Coşkun okurlarına sordu: Ne yapayım?
date=2007-08-16
work=NTV-MSNBC
language=Turkish]

* After Emin Çölaşan left Hürriyet, for a while he considered leaving as well. In the mean time, rival newspaper and staunchly secularist "Cumhuriyet" (The Republic) offered him to become one of their columnists. The absence of Coşkun's columns for a period of two weeks in August 2007 was attributed by some to an imminent switch. During this time, Aydın Doğan, the owner of the most powerful media conglomerate in Turkey (Doğan Media Group, which owns Hürriyet) convinced "Cumhuriyet" representatives to retract their offer. [cite news|url=http://www.internethaber.com/news_detail.php?id=102769&interstitial=true
accessdate=2008-08-28
title=Bekir Coşkun neden yok?
date=2007-09-06
language=Turkish
work=Internet Haber] He writes for Hürriyet to this day.

Books

* "Ben Pako" (2005) [http://www.ideefixe.com/Kitap/urun_liste.asp?kid=19375&query=0&f=1 Bekir Coşkun ] , IDéEFIXE]
* "Pako'ya Mektuplar" (2000)
* "Avukatımı İstiyorum..." (1998)

See also

* Media of Turkey
* Secularism in Turkey

References

External links

* [http://hurarsiv.hurriyet.com.tr/yazarlar/default.aspx?ID=2 Onuncu Koy] Bekir Coşkun's daily column in "Hürriyet" tr