Abstract
Human rights in Turkey that were the result of many years’ struggle have been suspended since the failed coup attempt of July 15, 2016. Torture in police custody and prisons has escalated. No opposition is tolerated. People are arrested on a daily basis whenever and wherever they protest. More than 150,000 civil servants have been dismissed, some 7000 of them academics. Around 500 of these academics are peace petitioners, which contradicts statements made by the government that the dismissals are of those affiliated with the Gülen movement. Dismissals through decrees are used as means of opponent purge. All opposition media and NGOs have been shut down. Some 150 journalists are now in jail, members of parliament and mayors from the third opposition party have been jailed. The prison population in Turkey now exceeds 220,000.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
http://www.tuerkeiforum.net/docs/tr/tihv2009raporu.pdf (pp. 279–283).
- 2.
The Regulation of Judicial and Preventive Search (2005) defines reasonable doubt as following: “Reasonable doubt is a doubt that usually occurs due to concrete events in the face of life’s flow. Reasonable doubt is determined through taking certain factors into consideration such as venue and time of the event, attitudes and behaviors of people accompanying the defendant, nature of goods that the law enforcement officers suspected as being carried. In the case of reasonable doubt, there needs to be signs supporting the denunciation and claims. The doubt must be based on concrete facts in the case of mentioned factors. There needs to be concrete facts that would foresee finding of a certain thing or catching a specific person at the end of the search.”
- 3.
The court rendered verdicts for 19 defendants in the case concerning the killing of Agos newspaper editor-in-chief Hrant Dink on January 19, 2007. Yasin Hayal, who had been jailed pending trial, was sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment for “instigating the murder.” The defendant Erhan Tuncel was not punished. The court decided that the case was not a mafia murder.
- 4.
The defendants, policemen and tradesmen, were charged with the murder of college student Ali İsmail Korkmaz during the Gezi protests in Eskişehir. Police officers Hüseyin Engin and Saban Gökpınar were acquitted.
- 5.
Saturday Mothers is a group of relatives of victims of state-forced disappearances who are under police custody and of unsolved political murders. They have been organizing sit-ins at Galatasaray Square every Saturday since May 27, 1995, as a testament to their search for their relatives.
- 6.
A gendarmerie operation was launched in Burdur Prison on July 5, 2000, after 11 detainees started riots and hunger strikes against poor prison conditions and a court decision to forcibly take them to a court hearing. On the day of the operation, the gendarmerie demolished the prison walls using bulldozers so as to reach the area wherein the detainees were residing. The right arm of the political prisoner Veli Saçılık was torn off by bulldozer blows during the demolition. The arm, thrown into the trash, was found in the mouth of a stray dog. After his release, Saçılık applied to the European Convention on Human Rights, which found Turkey guilty of violating “prohibition of torture and maltreatment” and sentenced the country to pay compensation to Veli Saçılık (European Court of Human Rights 2011). Later, the Turkish Council of State reversed the ECHR decision and found Saçılık guilty of damaging the state with a prison rebellion. The council asked him to pay the indemnity of 150,000 TL that he received from the state several years back, with interest of approximately 725,000 TL. It was decided that the money would be collected as deductions from Saçılık’s salary. Saçılık applied again to the ECHR, reporting the newest developments. The ECHR gave its final verdict in 2015, stating that Turkey cannot require Saçılık to return the indemnity paid to him and warning Turkey to take its verdicts seriously (European 2015).
- 7.
The body of Ali Yıldız, who was killed in April 1997 in the Çemişkezek district of Tunceli along with 19 other people, was found in a mass grave in Çemişkezek after his brother Hüsnü Yıldız had continued his hunger strike in Tunceli for 66 days.
- 8.
Hüsnü Yıldız’ın Açlık Grevi Sona Erdi (2011), http://www.radikal.com.tr/turkiye/husnu-yildizin-aclik-grevi-sona-erdi-1059944/, Accessed 25 December 2017.
References
Meclis Araştırması Komisyonu. (2012). Ülkemizde Demokrasiye Müdahale Eden Tüm Darbe ve Muhtıralar İle Demokrasiyi İşlevsiz Kılan Diğer Bütün Girişim ve Süreçlerin Tüm Boyutları İle Araştırılarak Alınması Gereken Önlemlerin Belirlenmesi Amacıyla Kurulan Meclis Araştırması Komisyonu Raporu [Parliamentary Research Commission (2012) The Report of the Parliamentary Research Commission that was established towards determining the measures to prevent them, to elaborate all the process and attempts that leave the democracy dysfunctional and all the coups and memorandums that intervenes in democracy] Vol 1. No 37, Ankara: Türkiye Büyük Millet Meclisi. Retrieved November 10, 2017, from http://www.tbmm.gov.tr/sirasayi/donem24/yil01/ss376_Cilt1.pdf.
European Court of Human Rights. (2011). Case of Saçilik and others v. Turkey (Applications nos. 43044/05 and 45001/05). Retrieved December 2, 2017, from http://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng?i=001–105499.
European Court of Human Rights. (2015). CASE OF SAÇILIK AND OTHERS v. TURKEY (Applications nos. 43044/05 and 45001/05). Retrieved December 2, 2017, from http://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng?i=001–153764.
Human Rights Association of Turkey. (2014). 348 Toplu Mezar, 4 Bin 201 Ceset. Retrieved December 25, 2017, from http://www.cumhuriyet.com.tr/haber/turkiye/163719/348_toplu_mezar__4_bin_201_ceset.html.
Human Rights Foundation of Turkey. (2017). Türkiye İnsan Hakları Raporu 2009. Retrieved December 25, 2017, from http://www.tuerkeiforum.net/docs/tr/tihv2009raporu.pdf.
Hüsnü Yıldız’ın Açlık Grevi Sona Erdi. (2011). Retrieved December 25, 2017, from http://www.radikal.com.tr/turkiye/husnu-yildizin-aclik-grevi-sona-erdi-1059944/.
Regulation of Judicial and Preventive Search. (2015). Law number, Turkish XX Law, 1st June 2015. Retrieved December 25, 2017, from https://www.tbmm.gov.tr/komisyon/insanhaklari/belge/um_adliveonlemearamalari.pdf.
Secretary-General of the United Nations Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights. (20XX). Title. Retrieved December XX, 2017, from http://URL.
Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation (TESEV). (2007). Mithat Sancar, Eylem Ümit, “Yargıda Algı ve Zihniyet Kalıpları,” İnsan Hakları Savunucuları. Retrieved December 27, 2017, from http://www.insanhaklarisavunuculari.org/dokumantasyon/items/show/583.
Turkish Medical Association. (2013). TTB: Biber gazı kimyasal silah olarak kabul edilmeli ve yasaklanmalı. Retrieved December 27, 2017, from https://www.medikalakademi.com.tr/ttb-biber-gazi-kimyasal-silah-yasak-gezi-parki/.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Fincancı, Ş.K., interviewed by Aylin Tekiner (2019). Human Rights Activism. In: Özyürek, E., Özpınar, G., Altındiş, E. (eds) Authoritarianism and Resistance in Turkey. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76705-5_20
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-76705-5_20
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-76704-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-76705-5
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)