Barış Pehlivan

Barış Pehlivan (IPA: [bäɾɯʃ pe̞hliβän]; born July 10, 1983) is a Turkish journalist and writer investigating mainly about Turkish contemporary history and politics.
In February 2011, he was arrested and kept in detention at Istanbul’s Silivri Prison in connection with his work at odatv, accused of links to the Ergenekon organization. In September 2012, he was released pending trial following an judicial report confirming that the evidence collected against the journalist have probably been digitally forged and sent using a trojan horse to infect his computer. The case against Pehlivan and his colleagues continues.

In 2004, Barış Pehlivan worked as a reporter at Kaçak Yayın Dergisi, an art magazine owned by the Leman Group. He worked as a project assistant, director’s assistant, and publisher respectively in the documentary programs named ‘Paranın Seyir Defteri’, ‘Şair Ceketli Çocuk: Kazım Koyuncu’, and ‘Nohut Oda Bakla Sofa’. He contributed to the program 5N1K with the stories ‘Land Sales to Foreigners’ and ‘Assassination of Shah Massoud’. Since 2007, Pehlivan is working as the executive editor for the online news website called OdaTV.com founded by the investigative journalist Soner Yalçın.

Barış Pehlivan produced the political documentary Oradaydım between the years 2005 and 2010. The series explain the stories of more than 250 events related to recent Turkish history. In an episode published on February 24, 2007, the documentary focused on the events of the 12th of September 1980 in a Diyarbakır prison. Pehlivan was put on trial as a producer and was accused of fomenting public discord. In 2008, he was acquitted.

Pehlivan co-authored the book Sızıntı: Wikileaks’te Ünlü Türkler (The Leak: The Popular Turks of Wikileaks) with colleague Barış Terkoğlu. The journalists analyzed the cryptos of the US State Departement which were exposed by WikiLeaks in November 2010.

On February 14, 2011, the Turkish police took Pehlivan into custody following the search of his house and OdaTV office, and accused of being part of the Ergenekon organization - one a substantial number of journalists accused in relation to odatv. He was not brought before a judge and formally charged until more than nine months after his arrest, on November 22, 2011. In September 2012, he was released pending trial following an judicial report confirming that the evidence collected against the journalist have probably been digitally forged and sent using a trojan horse to infect his computer. Subsequent analysis of Barış Pehlivan’s OdaTV computer by digital forensics company Arsenal Consulting revealed local attacks, which required physical access, were responsible for delivery of the incriminating documents.