Accused of trying to smuggle antiques from Turkey

Davíð Örn Bjarnason, a 28 year old Icelander was arrested on march 8th in Turkey. Turkish authorities accuse him of smuggling antiques.

Davíð Örn and his girlfriend were on their way home after a holiday in Antalya, Turkey when things took a sudden turn for the worse. During regulated search at the airport, Turkish authorities found Marmara stone in Davíð's luggage. As a result, Davíð was arrested. Davíð's girlfriend however was permitted to return to Sweden, where the Icelandic couple resides among their two children.

The Icelandic consular in Ankara got Davíð released on march 14th after a week stay in prison. Davíð was to await trial, on a travel ban.
On march 26th the travel ban was lifted and Davíð allowed to travel back to Sweden and be reunited with his family. However, should he be found guilty, Davíð will face an even longer imprisonment and a fine.

This serious matter is not the first of it's kind. A search on the net revealed many similar cases. For example;
A Chinese family of four were obligated to spend a few extra days in Turkey to appear in court on charges of smuggling antiques. A young Spanish boy was imprisoned in 2012 for trying to take two marble stones with him back to Spain as souvenirs. A Swedish diplomat was imprisoned after authorities found a small piece of marble stone in his suitcase.

All these cases have one thing in common. Non of the people that were arrested were aware of the fact that it was illegal to take these stones out of the country. The travel agencies these people bought their tickets from did not have it noted in the information that the people got with their tickets. These cases show the importance of information-giving from the travel agencies, and that people seek information before traveling to a foreign country.

What is investigative journalism

Journalism is the practice of investigating and reporting events, issues and trends. The main intention of journalism is to provide the audience with reliable, accurate information. There are many different jobs in journalism but my main focus will be on investigative journalism.

                                                           Investigative journalism

A journalist will have to conduct a research and gather information on the topic before writing the actual article. The topic is usually one that someone else is trying to hide. You might say that journalists use three tools to gather information. They are; observation, interview and background check.

The goal of investigative journalism is to uphold a true and just democracy, to always tell the truth and hold those in power accountable.
You could say that investigative journalism includes these three things;

Uncover scandals. Aimed at detecting violations of laws, rules or norms of decency, by organisations or individuals.

Review of policies or functioning of government, businesses and other organisations.

Draw attention to social, economic, political and cultural trends. Aimed at detecting changes in society.

The most critical qualifications a investigative journalist can have is the urge to ask the question "why?" and the will to change the wrongs in today's society.

Margot Williams, a journalist at the National Public Radio in Washington DC, held a lecture on investigative journalism in Iceland on may 31st in 2012. Following the lecture she spread a document which contained numerous URLs that are useful on finding information about individuals and companies. You can click the link below to take a look at the document.

http://www.icij.is/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Vefsidur-Margot-Williams.pdf

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