European Court: Turkey Broke Law by Arresting Amnesty Campaigner

A protester calls for the release of Taner Kilic, the president of the Turkish section of Amnesty International, outside the Turkish embassy in Berlin, February 2018. Photo: EPA-EFE/MARKUS HEINE

The ECHR said that Turkey violated the European Convention on Human Rights when it placed Kilic in pre-trial detention, as well as violating his freedom of speech.

"The court held that the government had been unable to show that, on the date at which the applicant was initially placed in pre-trial detention or during the subsequent phases of his pre-trial detention, the evidence cited by the national judges had met the standard of 'reasonable suspicion' required by Article 5 of the Convention, such as to satisfy an objective observer that the applicant could have committed the offences for which he had been detained," the ECHR's ruling said.

The ECHR said it found Kilic's pre-trial detention "unjustified".

It added that it found "the interpretation and application of the legislative provisions relied on by the domestic authorities" to have been "unreasonable, so as to render Mr Kilic's detention unlawful and arbitrary".

It also said that the Turkish government directly interfered in the freedom expression of Kilic as a human rights defender.

"The court considered that Mr Kilic's initial placement in pre-trial detention in the context of the second set of criminal proceedings brought against him, on account of actions that were directly linked to his activity as a human-rights defender, amounted to a genuine and effective restriction and thus an 'interference' in the exercise of his right to freedom of expression," the ECHR said.

Kilic was arrested in June 2017 on suspicion of belonging to the organisation described by the Turkish...