Breach of a fair trial, independence of the judiciary and principles on the role of Lawyers.
October 2019, Istanbul
A group of 15 lawyers from 7 European countries met in Istanbul from 13 till 15 October 2019 for a fact-finding mission to clarify the legal circumstances that led to the conviction of the following 18 Turkish lawyers by the 37 High Criminal Court of Istanbul in March 2019:
– For “founding and leading a terrorist organization” – Barkin TIMTIK: 18 years and 9 months For “membership of a terrorist organization” – Ebru TIMTIK and Özgür YILMAZ: 13 years and 6 months – Behiç ASÇI and Sükriye ERDEN: 12 years – Selçuk KOZAGACLI (President of the ÇHD) : 11 years and 3 months – Engin GÖKOGLU, Aytac ÜNSAL and Süleyman GÖKTEN : 10 years and 6 months – Aycan ÇIÇEK and Naciye DEMIR: 9 years – Ezgi CAKIR: 8 years
– For “willfully and knowingly aiding a terrorist organization” – Aysegül CAGATAY, Yagmur EREREN, Didem Baydar ÜNSAL and Yaprak TÜRKMEN: 3 years 9 months – Zehra ÖZDEMIR and Ahmet MANDACI: 3 years, 1 month and 15 days (sentence reduced because of their presence at the hearing on 20 March 2019, unlike the other defendants).
The European lawyers of the monitoring team came from Austria, Belgium, Catalonia/Spain, Greece, Germany, France, and Italy. They represented, among others, two international associations of lawyers, two European lawyers’ organizations, the European umbrella association of bar associations, various national and regional bar associations and lawyers’ organizations.
These are their findings: REPORT
The lawyers of the monitoring team represented the following organizations:
- ELDH – European Association of Lawyers for Democracy and World Human Rights
- AED-EDL – European Democratic Lawyers
- The foundation The Day of the Endangered Lawyer
- IADL – International Association of Democratic Lawyers
- Progress Lawyers Network
- Giuristi Democratici
- CCBE The Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe
- CNB – French National Bar Council (Conseil national des barreaux)
- OIAD – Observatoire International des Avocats en Danger (The International Observatory
of Endangered Lawyers) - UCPI – Unione delle Camere Penali Italiane
- Consiglio Nazionale Forense (Italian National Bar Association)
- DSF AS – Défense Sans frontière – Avocats Solidaires
- UIA International Association of Lawyers
- OBFG/Avocats.be (Association of French speaking Bars of Belgium)
- Paris Bar Association
- Athens Bar Association
- Barcelona Bar Association
- Berlin Bar Association
- Brussels (French-speaking) Bar Association
- Brussels (Dutch-speaking) Bar Association (NOAB)
- Liège Bar Association
- Vienna Bar Association