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Documentary filmmaker, arrested on terrorism charges, released on judicial probation

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A documentary filmmaker and journalist who was detained while shooting a film in Ankara in mid December has been released from pretrial detention on judicial probation, according to her lawyer.

Sibel Tekin, who was taken into custody while shooting a film in Ankara on Dec. 16, was arrested on terrorism charges a day later. She was detained following a complaint by law enforcement that she deliberately filmed a police car while shooting videos for her new project about daylight saving time in Turkey.

Tekin, who was jailed in Sincan Prison in Ankara, was released on Monday, her lawyer Mehtap Sakinci announced on Twitter, while thanking everyone who showed solidarity with the director.

An indictment accuses Tekin of membership in a terrorist organization, but the prosecutor does not mention in which terrorist organization she has membership.

Tekin has shot documentaries on a wide range of events and protests that challenge the narrative of the Turkish government, such as twin bombings in Ankara in 2015 by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) that claimed the lives of 103 people; the anti-government Gezi Park protests of 2013; and a historic strike launched by the Tekel tobacco workers in Turkey in 2009 following the company’s privatization.

She is known as the “Memory of Ankara.”

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