Following the killing of Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in Istanbul on 19 January 2007 various lists of journalists killed in Turkey since the early 20th century were published. One such list was published by the Turkish Association of Journalists (tr: Türkiye Gazeteciler Cemiyeti). It contains 68 names of journalists killed between 1909 and 2022. A "Platform of imprisoned journalists" published a list in April 2012 that contained 112 names. Yet, it is difficult to obtain detailed information in particular on early cases, in order to determine whether the deaths had been assassinations directly linked to the profession of the victims.
It also appears that some people were not journalists by profession, but affiliated to certain publications as readers, vendors or even part-time publishers of political comments. These people will not be included in the lists, apart from people who were killed because they distributed certain publications.
In some cases, the state has been involved in the deaths of Kurdish journalists.
Killings until September 1980 Only few cases of journalists killed in Turkey between the foundation of the Republic and the military coup of 12 September 1980 were listed. Yet, some of these killings were high-profile assassinations that contributed to the atmosphere of political violence (often termed "civil war") that the Turkish army used as the main reason for its intervention. A bit more information is available on some of the 15 cases reported for this period: {| class = wikitable ! Name!!Publication!!Place!!Date!!Remarks |- | Hikmet Şevket||||||1930|| |- | Sabahattin Ali|| Marko Paşa|| Edirne|| 2 April 1948||listed under writers |- | Hüseyin Şen||KAWA||Istanbul||21 March 1978||He was the editor-in-chief of the journal and member of a Kurdish newspaper. He was allegedly tortured and killed in Selimiye (Istanbul) military prison.See an article written by his friends at Newroz Şehidi Hüseyin Şen Yoldaş!! ; here the date of death is given as 21 March 1979; Retrieved 31 October 2012 |- | Gani Bozarslan|| Aydınlık||||10 May 1978||Translated books from Kurdish to Turkish |- | Ali İhsan Özgür||Politika||Istanbul||21 November 1978||Politika was first issued by DİSK and later by the TKP. Ali İhsan Özgür disappeared so that the family had difficulties in identifying him. |- | Cengiz Polatkan|| Hafta Sonu|| Ankara||1 December 1978|| |- | Abdi İpekçi|| Milliyet|| rowspan="4" | Istanbul||1 February 1979||Two members of the ultra-nationalist Grey Wolves, Oral Çelik and Mehmet Ali Ağca (who later shot pope John Paul II), murdered Abdi İpekçi in his car on the way back home from his office in front of his apartment building in Istanbul.Ganser, Daniele, NATO's secret armies: operation Gladio and terrorism in Western Europe, (Routledge, 2005), 238. Ağca was caught due to an informant and was sentenced to life in prison. After serving six months in a military prison in Istanbul, Ağca escaped with the help of military officer. |- | İlhan Darendelioğlu|| rowspan="2" |Ortadoğu||19 November 1979||Member of the MHP, see :tr:İlhan Egemen Darendelioğlu |- | İsmail Gerçeksöz||4 April 1980||Also published books |- | Ümit Kaftancıoğlu|| TRT|| 11 April 1980||Right-wing Ahmet Mustafa Kıvılcım stated in his interrogation by the police that he killed Ümit Kaftancıoğlu, because he was a "leftist", but later rejected the statement. He remained four months in pre-trial detention and was released. The assailants were not found. |- | Muzaffer Fevzioğlu|| Hizmet|| Trabzon|| 15 April 1980|| |- | Hayrabet Honca|| Halkın Birliği|| Kayseri||1 May 1980||Member of TKP/ML Hareketi, killed by right-wingers |- | Recai Ünal||Demokrat||Istanbul||22 July 1980||Allegedly kidnapped and tortured
Killings in the 1980s and 1990s with laicist journalists as targets
After the military coup of 1980 fewer journalists were killed in the fight between the radical left and the extreme right. After the end of the 1980s there have been several killings of journalists known for their anti-government attitude and secular (in Turkey also termed laicist). In some cases members of radical Islamic organizations have been prosecuted and condemned for these killings. In one case a militant of the PKK allegedly confessed to such a killing. Other killings in the 1980s and 1990s include: {| class="wikitable" !Name!!Publication!!Place!!Date!!Remarks |- | Mevlüt Işıt||Türkiye||Ankara ||1 June 1988|| |- | Kamil Başaran||Gazete||Istanbul ||28 February 1989||Shot by the owner of a restaurant, who did not like his way of reporting. |- | Seracettin Müftüoğlu||Hürriyet||Nusaybin||29 June 1989|| |- | Sami Başaran||Gazete|| rowspan="3" |Istanbul ||7 November 1989||He had an interview with the leader of a Kurdish tribe from Mardin in his office in Aksaray (Istanbul), where he was shot |- | Çetin Emeç||Hürriyet||7 March 1990||Two people entered his car and shot him and his driver Sinan Ercan. Four members of the Islamic Movement Organization (tr: İslami Hareket Örgütü were sentenced to life imprisonment, but his brother does not believe that the true killers were caught. |- | Turan Dursun||2000'e Doğru||4 September 1990||A member of the Islamic Movement Organization (tr: İslami Hareket Örgütü was sentenced to life imprisonment, but the person believed to be his killer remains free. |- | Uğur Mumcu|| rowspan="3" |Cumhuriyet||Ankara ||24 January 1993||While different hypothesis exist on who was behind the killing the prosecutor's office in Ankara maintains that two assassins were sentenced and a case opened against the third suspect, all three of them being members of the Tawhid-Salaam Jerusalem Organization (tr: Tevhid-Selam Kudüs) that was allegedly behind the murder. |- | Onat Kutlar||Istanbul||11 January 1995||The brother of the archaeologist Yasemin Cebenoyan, who had died in the same bomb attack, complained that many people thought the murder had not been solved or that an Islamic organization was behind it. He was convicted in 2005, but as a confessor was released after 9.5 years' imprisonment. The attack was later revealed to be carried out by the PKK. |- | Ahmet Taner Kışlalı ||Ankara ||21 October 1999||His death as well as the killings of Uğur Mumcu, Prof. Dr. Ahmet Taner Kışlalı, Prof. Dr. Muammer Aksoy and Assistant Professor Dr. Bahriye Üçok were the subject of a trial at Ankara Heavy Penal Court 11 known as the Umut (Hope) case. The court ruled that the defendants had formed an illegal organization by the name of "Kudüs Ordusu" (Jerusalem Army) and "Tevhid Selam" (Tawhid-Salaam) and had committed violent acts in Turkey. On 28 July 2005 one defendant was sentenced to life imprisonment, while seven others received sentences as leaders or members of an illegal organization. The Court of Cassation confirmed the sentence of the main suspect on 11 November 2006.
Journalists and vendors killed in the Kurdish-Turkish conflict In the 1990s the Kurdish-Turkish conflict became harsher with a large number of casualties on both sides. At the same time more and more civilians fell victim to extrajudicial killings, murders by unknown assailants (tr: faili meçhul), a term used in Turkish to indicate that the perpetrators were not identified because of them being protected by the State and cases of disappearance. Soon after the pro-Kurdish press had started to publish the first daily newspaper by the name of "Özgür Gündem" (Free Agenda) killings of Kurdish journalists started. In many cases, the state was blamed for murders and in some cases the Turkish variety of the radical Islamic organization Hizbullah was made responsible for the killings, in others the PKK was accused, but the majority remained without a clear indication to the persons behind the fatal attacks. Hardly any of them has been clarified or resulted in sanctions for the assailants. Among the 33 journalists that were killed in the first half of the 1990s are also cases not related to the Kurdish conflict. In 2008, the European Court of Human Right condemned Turkey for executing and assassinating Kurdish journalists and writers. Musa Anter, a prominent Kurdish writer, was killed by JİTEM in 1992.
Among Kurdish patriots (tr: yurtsever, often used as an acronym for sympathizers of the PKK by the state) the "tradition" that started with Özgür Gündem is often called "history of the free press". In this context the figure of 76 victims (called martyrs of the press; tr: basın şehitleri) is often mentioned.See a film produced on the 20th anniversary of Özgür Gündem reproduced on the Wiki "B-Ob8ungen" under Freie Presse oder Partei im Kurdenkonflikt? (text in Turkish and German); accessed on 30 October 2012 In 2008, the ECHR has condemned Turkey for assassinating Musa Anter who was working for Özgur Gundem.
Yet, the number of staff members of the "free press" and volunteers to distribute dailies and weeklies termed "Kurdish free press" that were killed "on duty", particularly during the early stages of reporting on the Kurdish question in Turkey remains high. The list of names of distributors of Özgür Gündem and its successors that were killed (while the perpetrators mostly remained unknown) includes 18 names. Among the 33 journalists that were killed between 1990 and 1995 most were working for the so-called Kurdish Free Press.
{| class = "wikitable" ! Name!!Publication!!Place!!Date!!Remarks |- | Gündüz Etil ||Yeni Günaydın||Istanbul||18 September 1991|| |- | Halit Güngen||2000'e Doğru||Diyarbakır ||18 February 1992||Killed by unidentified persons two days after reporting that eyewitnesses and sympathizers of Turkish Hezbollah had said that members of the organization were educated in the headquarters of Turkey's rapid deployment force (Çevik Kuvvet) in Diyarbakır. |- | Cengiz Altun||Yeni Ülke||Batman ||25 February 1992||Killed by six bullets fired into his back as he was on his way to work.The report of Human Rights Watch: The Kurds of Turkey: Killings, Disappearances and Torture of March 1993 can be found as google-books or as a PDF file ; accessed on 31 October 2012 |- | İzzet Kezer||Sabah||Cizre, Şırnak Province||23 March 1992||A journalist for the mainstream daily, Sabah; shot and killed by security forces during violence that followed the celebration of the Kurdish New Year. During a state-imposed curfew, Kezer and other journalists emerged from their hotel waving white flags. No shooting was going on at the time. Kezer, at the head of the group, reached an intersection and was shot dead by security forces who fired from an armored personnel carrier. No action was taken against the security forces responsible for his death. |- | Bülent Ülkü||Körfeze Bakış||Bursa ||1 April 1992||Found wounded near Uludağ on 1 April and died shortly afterwards. The autopsy certified marks of handcuffs and ink on his fingers.See the annual report of the Human Rights Foundation for 1992 (Turkish), Ankara January 1993, pages 143-148 Officials claimed that he was the victims of an internal dispute between left-wing organizations, but friends denied this.See an article of 22 September 2011 and a comment in "sosyalist barikat" of September 1992 Basına Saldırılar Sistemleşiyor ; accessed on 1 November 2012 |- | Mecit Akgün||2000e Doğru||Nusaybin, Mardin||2 June 1992||His body was found hanging from a telephone pole near the village of Colova in Nusaybin. It was claimed that a statement was found on his body saying that he was "punished because he was a traitor", this was allegedly signed by the PKK. |- | Hafız Akdemir||Özgür Gündem||Diyarbakır ||8 June 1992||Killed by a single bullet into the back of his head, fifty meters from his home in Diyarbakir. Özgür Gündem began publication on 30 May 1992; reporters stated that they had received telephoned threats for several days, several addressed to Akdemir. He had written about the Islamic organization Hezbollah and Turkish counterguerrillas. |-