ISTANBUL (AP) — A court has convicted two prominent journalists of aiding a terror group but also ordered them released for time served.
The official Anadolu news agency reports the court in Istanbul on Monday convicted Ahmet Altan and Nazli Ilicak of aiding the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom Turkish officials identified as the mastermind of a failed 2016 coup. The charge was aiding a terror group without being members of the group.
Altan and Ilicak previously had been convicted of attempting to overthrow the government and sentenced to life in prison. The Supreme court overturned those convictions in July. Altan was sentenced on the new charges to 10 1/2 years and Ilicak to nearly nine. Both had been detained since July 2016.
The court also acquitted Altan’s brother, newspaper columnist Mehmet Altan, of a charge of attempting to overthrow the government. Altan was previously convicted on that charge.
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This story has been edited to correct that the journalists’ convictions on the previous charges were overturned, and that the new sentences were given for the new charges.