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Erin Cunningham
A reporter from the Middle East covering Iran, Turkey, Syria and the wider region
BREAKING: Brunson will leave his apartment in Turkey to get to the airport and leave the country. His lawyer, Jay Sekulow, said Brunson would be sent to a US air base in Germany, where he would be assessed and eventually returned to the United States.
This is a story in development and will be updated.
ALIAGA, Turkey – A Turkish court on Friday sentenced American pastor Andrew Brunson for contributing to terrorism, but sentenced him to serve the sentence and ordered his immediate release.
The case of the evangelical preacher ensnared by security surveillance after the coup in Turkey had attracted attention at the highest level of the US government and had become a sore spot in the relations between the two countries.
Minutes after the verdict, President Trump tweeted, "working very hard on Pastor Brunson".
"PASTOR BRUNSON HAS BEEN RELEASED," he tweeted later. "WILL SOON AT HOME!"
Turkish soldiers stand guard at the entrance of the Aliaga prison yard after the arrival of American pastor Andrew Brunson before the hearing which was held Friday in Izmir , in Turkey. (Chris Mcgrath / Getty Images)
While Brunson, 50, was found guilty of terrorism and sentenced to three years in prison, the judge reduced his sentence to two years served for good behavior. The pastor has been under house arrest since July for health reasons, but this arrangement has also ended to allow him to leave the country.
"The verdict was the best of a bad situation," said Brunson's defense lawyer, Ismail Cem Halavurt, in the western court of Turkey.
On Brunson's plans to travel to the United States, Halavurt said, "He's going to leave".
"But I hope he can come back," he added. "It's someone who absolutely loves Turkey."
The clerk, originally from North Carolina, cried and kissed his wife, Norine, waiting for the judge to make his decision on Friday.
His trial resumed Friday in Aliaga, a district located about 40 km from his longtime home in the city of Izmir, just hours after US officials had announced that an agreement had been reached with the Turkish authorities to secure his release.
He was leading a small evangelical congregation in Izmir until his detention two years ago.
The pastor has since been detained for what the Trump government and himself have called false accusations related to terrorism and espionage. Prosecutors accused him of being linked to both Kurdish separatists and a Muslim Muslim based in the United States. Turkish authorities said they orchestrated a failed coup d'état attempt in 2016.
Despite being released from prison in July, Brunson's trial helped to widen the gap between Turkey and the United States, already in contradiction with the latter's support for Kurdish fighters fighting the Islamic State in Syria.
Vice President Pence paid particular attention to Brunson's case and helped mobilize Trump's evangelical political base to support the cause.
[[[[Trump administration optimistic about release of detained pastor in Turkey]
In recent months, the government has made the release of the pastor a priority. In August, the United States imposed sanctions on two Turkish ministers in order to put pressure on local authorities.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said his government could not intervene in a court case. But US officials said Thursday that an agreement between the two parties on Brunson's release had been negotiated on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly last month.
The deal, they said, would include the lifting of US sanctions in return for a reduction in charges allowing Brunson to either be sentenced to serve his sentence or to serve the remaining sentence in the United States.
Turkish prosecutors had sought a 35-year sentence in Brunson, which they accused of spying and supporting terrorists under the guise of humanitarian aid and interreligious dialogue. This claim was then reduced to 10 years at trial.
[Video: Who is Andrew Brunson?]
Brunson was overwhelmed by the wave of arrests that followed the failed coup d'état of July 2016, in which tens of thousands of people – including ordinary artists, intellectuals and Turks – have been arrested. Prosecutors also claimed that he supported members of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, which has been leading for decades an insurgency against the Turkish state.
The PKK is a resolutely secular and left-wing organization. The indictment against Brunson quotes a witness who allegedly stated that members of the Brunson Resurrection Church in Izmir Province wore the "flags and banners of the PKK terrorist organization" .
But at the Aliaga district courthouse in Izmir on Friday, a series of prosecution witnesses, including one by videoconference, gave scattered and sometimes contradictory testimony.
A witness, Levent Kalkan, said the investigators misunderstood his initial testimony, which had involved Brunson in hosting coup suspects in 2016.
The man Kalkan said that he had witnessed the protection of the fugitives appeared in court on Friday to say that he had not seen anything like it.
"I never said that to Levent," said the witness, Yilmaz Demirjan.
Brunson, sitting alone before a panel of judges and the public prosecutor, was also allowed to speak after the testimony of each witness.
"I have never met any PKK fighters," he told the judges in Turkish.
In his closing statement to the court just before the verdict was pronounced, Brunson said, "I am an innocent man. I love Jesus. I love this country "and I burst into tears.
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