The Arrested Lawyers Initiative published published its new report on the systematic attacks against the legal profession in Turkey.
The report reveals 474 lawyers have been sentenced to a total of 2,966 years in prison.
The Arrested Lawyers Initiative published a new report titled ‘Legal and Technical Issues Around Turkey’s Malicious Bylock Prosecutions‘ on criminalization of the usage of Bylock app that victimized more than 90,000 individuals. “Bylock data is not lawful and admissible… Read More ›
We spoke to Mr Philip Grant, the founder and executive director of Trial International. TRIAL International is a non-governmental organization fighting impunity for international crimes and supporting victims in their quest for justice. Philip Grant is TRIAL’s executive director, he… Read More ›
On the International Day of Endangered Lawyers – 2021, we have the privilege of having an exclusive interview with Mr Diego García-Sayán, the UN Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers. We talked about a wide range of topics: from growing authoritarianism to attacks on judges and lawyers; Poland, Turkey, Hungary, Italy and others.
A current revelation on the involvement of the Turkish authority for information and communication technologies (BTK) in bulk collection of telecommunication data on Turkish citizens indicates a Turkish-style Cambridge Analytica Scandal in the making.
The UN Special Rapporteur presented his report on the Protection of lawyers against undue interference in the free and independent exercise of the legal profession to the 50th Human Rights Council that is to be held in Geneva between 13… Read More ›
Erdoğan is widely criticized for taking the Turkish judiciary under his absolute control, particularly after the coup attempt in 2016, and for destroying the separation of powers. The appointment of such notorious judicial figures to posts in the Ministry of Justice dashes any hope of the possibility of a fair trial when Erdoğan dissidents are prosecuted.
The European Parliament particularly condemned continuing crackdown on lawyers. MEP said:
the Parliament “is appalled by reports of a pattern of persecution of lawyers representing individuals accused of terrorism whereby the lawyers were prosecuted for the same crime as that attributed to their client.”
The Council of Judges and Prosecutors (HSK) has decided that it would not take action against the judges who defied the judgment of the Constitutional Court dated January 2018 ordering the release of writer Mehmet Altan that causing him to… Read More ›
European Court of Human Rights found on 31 May 2022 that the pretrial detention of lawyer Taner Kılıç then president of Amnesty Turkey between June 2017 and August 2018 breached his several rights envisaged in the European Convention on Human Rights
After having conducted a digital examination that triggered a physical search, the Turkish lawyer and digital forensics expert, Dr. Levent Mazılıguney, found traces of spyware in the business computers of ten lawyers, and also located bugs at four law offices… Read More ›
No Country for Purge Victims| Lives of the purge victims are in shambles three and half years after the end of the state of emergency.
The Norwegian Helsinki Committee, the Italian Federation for Human Rights and the Arrested Lawyers Initiative called on the General Assembly of INTERPOL for legal and structural reforms to ensure that Interpol’s leaders adhere to high moral standards. In a joint… Read More ›
On the eve of the 89th General Assembly of the INTERPOL, 64 civil society organisations and individuals including renowned human rights activists, MPs and MEPs called for further reform to ensure that the INTERPOL complies with the Universal Declaration of… Read More ›
The authorities undermined fair trial guarantees by targeting lawyers for their professional activities. Lawyers continued to be subject to increasing pressure, taken into custody, detained, exposed to legal harassment through investigations and criminal proceedings.
FIDU – Italian Federation for Human Rights / Italian Helsinki Committee pursuant to the permission given by the European Court of Human Rights prepared a legal expert opinion on the abusive and unforeseeable use of anti-terror provision, namely Art. 314 of… Read More ›
References given to the Arrested Lawyers Initiative in English, Spanish, Italian, French and Greek language media.
Official statistics highlight that Turkish public prosecutors have filed more than 420,000 charges under Article 314 of the Turkish Penal Code within the last eight-years. What is worse, between 2016 and 2020 more than 265,000 individuals have been sentenced for membership of an armed terrorist organisation.
According to a report of the Council of Europe, Turkey has the largest population of inmates convicted for terrorism-related offences. The report shows there are currently a total of 30524 inmates in COE member states who were sentenced for terrorism, and Of those 29827 are in Turkish prisons.
Turkey Human Rights Accountability Projects makes its first submission to UK Foreign Office to have notable abusers of human rights in Turkey placed on the United Kingdom’s sanction list.
18 May 2021 marks the second anniversary of the torture incident which took place in Sanliurfa province of Turkey between 18 May 2019 and 28 May 2019, and victimized some fifty individuals.
Within the scope of Turkey Human Rights Accountability Project, the Arrested Lawyers Initiative summarily translated the report of Human Rights Center of Sanliurfa Bar Association to English. We also worked with renowned Italian artist Gianluca Costantini who illustrated the accounts of the victims.
The Arrested Lawyers Initiative, International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute, the Italian Federation for Human Rights, Italian National Bar Association and Justice Abroad arranged a conference bringing together international experts, human rights defenders, lawyers, and practitioners to discuss the impact… Read More ›
The Arrested Lawyers Initiative published the fifth edition of its report named ‘Mass Prosecution of Lawyers in Turkey‘.
The Arrested Lawyers Initiative 