International lawyers groups issue joint statement on KCK lawyers trial

PRESS RELEASE. JUNE 21st, 2013

International delegation observing lawyers trial 20 June in Istanbul

 

Today we, the undersigned, being a delegation of lawyers from five European countries, observed the fifth hearing, on the 20th June, 2013, of the trial of 46 lawyers, our colleagues, who face prosecution for being members of an illegal organisation, allegedly in the course of undertaking their professional duties, i.e acting as defence lawyers for the imprisoned Kurdish leader, Abdullah Ocalan.

While the procedures used by the authorities leading up to the arrests, for example,  seizure of confidential and privileged documents including client files, unlawful and unwarranted phone tapping and intercepting of private correspondence including emails, violate internationally acknowledged standards in human rights law, we are concerned that the hearings themselves breach the various criteria to be complied with to ensure that trials are “fair”. The defendants have had very limited opportunities to challenge the prosecutor’s evidence which has appeared most speculative and flimsy, but when they have done, they have exposed the indictments as being more often in the realm of fantasy than of fact.

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Margaret Owen: Blogs from Istanbul during fifth KCK lawyers trial hearing

Margaret Owen OBE, along with barrister Melanie Gingell and solicitor Ali Has, has continued  her excellent work as international trial monitor at the latest hearing of the KCK trial of 46 Kurdish lawyers, which took place last Thursday. Below are a series of blog posts written by Margaret about the ongoing protests in Istanbul, and of course about the latest developments in the trial.

Tuesday June 18th. Istanbul. Midnight.

We arrived in Istanbul late tonight, half expecting to find armed police, and even the army, blocking roads from the airport to the city, but all was strangely quiet.

Our taxi driver surprised us by saying that the city centre and Taksim square were deserted, and that the BBC and foreign media had grossly exaggerated the protest movement. He was quite angry at our questions and told us that now the demonstrations were all over and everyone had gone home.

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Legal Profession in Turkey under attack: Four lawyers sentenced to long prison terms

– Press Release –

On 24 January 2013, four Ankara lawyers, Ms Filiz Kalaycı,  Mr Hasan Anlar, Mr Halil İbrahim Vargün and Mr Murat Vargün received sentences ranging from  6 years and 3 months to 7 years and 6 months in jail on charges of being a member of “an armed, illegal organization”. International observers fear that these charges are merely based on the lawyers’ legitimate professional activities and their involvement in the promotion of universal human rights standards.

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