Several human rights organizations, including Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and Euromed Rights blasted on Monday Turkey for taking legal action against Ozturk Turkdogan, co-chair of the Human Rights Association (IHD), Turkey’s oldest human rights group, based on unfounded accusations.
Human rights defender Turkdogan is to stand trial in Ankara on Tuesday to face charges of membership in a terrorist organization that could place him behind bars for five to ten years if found guilty.
Human Rights Watch said that Turkdogan’s prosecution demonstrates the Erdogan government’s policy of targeting people involved in legitimate and peaceful civil society activities with baseless criminal charges.
He’s also facing separate trials for insulting the interior minister and the Turkish nation, the Republic of Turkey, state institutions, and bodies, with each accusation potentially landing him an additional two years in jail. All indictments against Turkdogan were prepared in December 2021.
Hugh Williamson, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said that the judicial prosecution of Turkdogan is Ankara’s attempt to criminalize legitimate human rights work and the right to free speech.
IHD’s records show that more than 200 separate criminal investigations and prosecutions of IHD members and elected representatives are ongoing across Turkey.
Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for Research for Europe, Julia Hall, called Turkdogan’s prosecution an undisguised attack on this human rights defender and on people who speak out for human rights in Turkey that sends a chilling message and increases the climate of intense fear among Turkey’s human rights community that’s already beleaguered.
AI also called for Turkey to immediately drop all charges against him.
According to Euromed Right’s statement, this is not the first instance of judicial harassment Turkdogan faced after his house was raided in 2021, an international travel ban was imposed against him and he was taken into police custody along with three top district officials of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP).
Turkdogan, who was released under judicial control, also faces additional criminal charges for publishing an article calling on Turkey to stop denying the Armenian Genocide.
The most serious charge Turkdogan faces, the membership in a terrorist organization, is based on his speeches, conversations, and statements made in his capacity as the IHD co-chair, including those calling for ending the prolonged solitary confinement of the jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, Abdullah Ocalan.
Be the first to comment