Constitutional Court in Turkey: Freedom of Expression of 'Academics for Peace' Violated

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Jul 29, 2019 Turkey
Image from Bianet. Image from Bianet.

Constitutional Court in Turkey: Freedom of Expression of "Academics for Peace" Violated

By : Tansu Pişkin and Hikmet Adal

The General Assembly of the Constitutional Court examined the individual applications of ten Academics for Peace who have been sentenced to prison on the charge of "propagandizing for a terrorist organization" for having signed the declaration entitled "We will not be a party to this crime."

The Court has ruled that the penalization of Academics for Peace on the charge of "terror propaganda" has violated their freedom of expression.

Academics for Peace Can Candan, İsmet Akça, Ömer Turan, Nesrin Sungur-Çakmak, and Ayşe Erzan and attorneys of Academics for Peace Meriç Eyüboğlu and İnayet Aksu have spoken to bianet about the Constitutional Court ruling: "What has to happen has happened."

Verdict Given with Eight "For" and Eight "Against" Votes


The Media and Law Studies Association (MLSA) has announced the verdict in the following words on its Twitter account:

"The decision was reached with eight 'for' and eight 'against' votes. When there is a tie, the President's vote is counted twice. Since Constitutional Court President Zühtü Arslan has voted that it was a violation, the Court found that the academics' rights were violated following today's deliberation.

"The Court decided that a copy of this judgment shall be sent to all local courts in order to eliminate this right's violation and advised for retrial. The court also ruled to pay each applicant nine thousand TRY in reparations."

The Verdict Will Affect All Trials


The verdict announced by the Constitutional Court today (26 July) will affect all trials of Academics for Peace. 

With this verdict, it will be possible to hold retrials for the ones who have been convicted, to give verdicts of reversal for the cases to be heard by the court of appeal and to give rulings of acquittal in the ongoing cases.

Candan: What has to happen has happened.

Lecturer Can Candan from Boğaziçi University, whose trial is still continuing at the İstanbul 35th Heavy Penal Court, has made the following remarks regarding the Constitutional Court ruling:

"What has to happen has happened. From the very beginning, we were saying that we made a statement within the scope of freedom of expression. We are, of course, free to express what we want and this right of ours is protected by the Constitution.

"There is a three-year period of time and labor wasted. Even standing trial was, in itself, a violation of freedom of expression and I think that whoever is responsible for that has to account for it."

Akça: We are proven right at the end of the day.

Sentenced to two years, three months in prison at the 33rd Heavy Penal Court, Assoc. Prof. İsmet Akça from Yıldız Technical University has stated:

"It is what we were saying from the very beginning. The Constitutional Court has nullified both the criminal suits filed against us and the prison sentences. That the Constitutional Court has given this ruling with eight 'for' and eight 'against' votes shows the unlawfulness of the verdicts given so far.

"In addition to that, our discharge by Statutory Decrees is also null and void. What needs to be done has to be done on both fronts. The verdicts were wrong from the very beginning. We are proven to be right at the end of the day. Now, what needs to be done should be done immediately."

Turan: We have taken a tough stance.

Assoc. Prof. Ömer Turan from Bilgi University, whose trial is continuing at the İstanbul 30th Heavy Penal Court, has stated:

"The declaration that we signed perhaps has symbolic importance for the ones living in the conflict-ridden cities, but we could not manage to raise the voice of peace. The price of the process is quite unequally distributed, we have also failed to solidarize with our friends discharged by statutory decrees. But, I think we have taken a tough stance in the legal struggle.

"If we could hold firm in the slightest in Çağlayan [Courthouse in İstanbul] and in courthouses in other cities, bianet's determination, follow-up, and adoption of this struggle as its own has had a really important role in that...

"The more we read each other's defenses, the clearer we saw the importance of getting strength from our rightfulness. While we were struggling against the cases filed separately against the signatories, the ever-expanding defense archive of bianet gave strength to us all. Thanks to the whole team. And, many thanks to especially Tansu Pişkin..."

Sungur-Çakmak: I am bit bitter, but still very happy.

Sentenced to one year, three months in prison at the İstanbul 32nd Heavy Penal Court, Prof. Dr. Nesrin Sungur-Çakmak has said:

"When I think of the lives that have fallen apart, my happiness remains a bit bitter, but I am still very happy. I hope that we will receive much better news."

Erzan: All cases need to be dropped without delay.

Sentenced to one year, three months in prison, Prof. Dr. Ayşe Erzan retired from İstanbul Technical University has stated, "All cases of 'Academics for Peace' have to be dropped without delay. And all signatories discharged by statutory decrees need to be reinstated in their jobs."

Eyüboğlu: We are happy, but it is not enough.

Meriç Eyüboğlu, the attorney of several Academics for Peace, has said:

"Since academics shared the declaration with the public, the judicial process was only one of the rights violations. After three and a half years, one of the judicial authorities has finally said that 'the right to freedom of expression was used.'

"Universities have been emptied, the academics who did not withdraw their signatures were forced to resign, several academics lost their jobs, the ones who went abroad could not come back. They have been sentenced to civilian death in their own terms. With the judicial process, the threat of prison and high sentences have been added to all of these.

"This verdict has made us happy, but only one of the violations faced [by academics] has been eliminated. However, considering its result, it will only affect the cases at Heavy Penal Courts. As a matter of fact, the ones discharged for having signed the declaration need to be reinstated. As long as the decisions of discharge are not withdrawn and all rights are not restored, this verdict of violation is not enough."

Aksu: The verdict is the result of struggle.

İnayet Aksu, who is also an attorney of Academics for Peace, has also made the following remarks about the Constitutional Court ruling:

"It always happens like that. They blew wind in the political conjecture and filed these lawsuits. But, our academics took a really tough stance. They did not leave anyone alone. Around 750 defenses were made in this process and all of the defenses were demanding peace and freedom.

"This verdict of the Constitutional Court is the result of struggle. It is not a favor of the government. If you remark, the verdict has been given with eight for and eight against votes. The freedom struggle has won."

What Happened?


The Constitutional Court convened on 29 May to examine the applications of the academics but adjourned the meeting on the ground that the Ministry of Justice did not submit the requested opinion.

The Ministry submitted its nine-page opinion on 25 June and referred to verdicts on the definition and content of freedom of expression.

The Court convened again on 3 July and discussed whether the applicants' freedom of expression had been violated. Afterward, it decided to refer the application to the General Assembly of the Constitutional Court.

Accordingly, the Court announced its ruling today and concluded that their freedom of expression has been violated.

[This article was originally published by Bianet on 26 July 2019.]
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Feb 16, 2011 Lebanon
Jadaliyya Reports By :
Jadaliyya Reports

Past is Present: Settler Colonialism Matters!

On 5-6 March 2011, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its seventh annual conference, "Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine." This year`s conference aims to understand Zionism as a settler colonial project which has, for more than a century, subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new Jewish Israeli society. By organizing this conference, we hope to reclaim and revive the settler colonial paradigm and to outline its potential to inform and guide political strategy and mobilization.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as unique and exceptional with little resemblance to other historical or ongoing colonial conflicts. Yet, for Zionism, like other settler colonial projects such as the British colonization of Ireland or European settlement of North America, South Africa or Australia, the imperative is to control the land and its resources -- and to displace the original inhabitants. Indeed, as conference keynote speaker Patrick Wolfe, one of the foremost scholars on settler colonialism and professor at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, argues, "the logic of this project, a sustained institutional tendency to eliminate the Indigenous population, informs a range of historical practices that might otherwise appear distinct--invasion is a structure not an event."[i]

Therefore, the classification of the Zionist movement as a settler colonial project, and the Israeli state as its manifestation, is not merely intended as a statement on the historical origins of Israel, nor as a rhetorical or polemical device. Rather, the aim is to highlight Zionism`s structural continuities and the ideology which informs Israeli policies and practices in Palestine and toward Palestinians everywhere. Thus, the Nakba -- whether viewed as a spontaneous, violent episode in war, or the implementation of a preconceived master plan -- should be understood as both the precondition for the creation of Israel and the logical outcome of Zionist settlement in Palestine.

Moreover, it is this same logic that sustains the continuation of the Nakba today. As remarked by Benny Morris, “had he [David Ben Gurion] carried out full expulsion--rather than partial--he would have stabilised the State of Israel for generations.”[ii] Yet, plagued by an “instability”--defined by the very existence of the Palestinian nation--Israel continues its daily state practices in its quest to fulfill Zionism’s logic to maximize the amount of land under its control with the minimum number of Palestinians on it. These practices take a painful array of manifestations: aerial and maritime bombardment, massacre and invasion, house demolitions, land theft, identity card confiscation, racist laws and loyalty tests, the wall, the siege on Gaza, cultural appropriation, and the dependence on willing (or unwilling) native collaboration and security arrangements, all with the continued support and backing of imperial power. 

Despite these enduring practices however, the settler colonial paradigm has largely fallen into disuse. As a paradigm, it once served as a primary ideological and political framework for all Palestinian political factions and trends, and informed the intellectual work of committed academics and revolutionary scholars, both Palestinians and Jews.

The conference thus asks where and why the settler colonial paradigm was lost, both in scholarship on Palestine and in politics; how do current analyses and theoretical trends that have arisen in its place address present and historical realities? While acknowledging the creativity of these new interpretations, we must nonetheless ask: when exactly did Palestinian natives find themselves in a "post-colonial" condition? When did the ongoing struggle over land become a "post-conflict" situation? When did Israel become a "post-Zionist" society? And when did the fortification of Palestinian ghettos and reservations become "state-building"?

In outlining settler colonialism as a central paradigm from which to understand Palestine, this conference re-invigorates it as a tool by which to analyze the present situation. In doing so, it contests solutions which accommodate Zionism, and more significantly, builds settler colonialism as a political analysis that can embolden and inform a strategy of active, mutual, and principled Palestinian alignment with the Arab struggle for self-determination, and indigenous struggles in the US, Latin America, Oceania, and elsewhere.

Such an alignment would expand the tools available to Palestinians and their solidarity movement, and reconnect the struggle to its own history of anti-colonial internationalism. At its core, this internationalism asserts that the Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism can only be won when it is embedded within, and empowered by, the broader Arab movement for emancipation and the indigenous, anti-racist and anti-colonial movement--from Arizona to Auckland.

SOAS Palestine Society invites everyone to join us at what promises to be a significant intervention in Palestine activism and scholarship.

For over 30 years, SOAS Palestine Society has heightened awareness and understanding of the Palestinian people, their rights, culture, and struggle for self-determination, amongst students, faculty, staff, and the broader public. SOAS Palestine society aims to continuously push the frontiers of discourse in an effort to make provocative arguments and to stimulate debate and organizing for justice in Palestine through relevant conferences, and events ranging from the intellectual and political impact of Edward Said`s life and work (2004), international law and the Palestine question (2005), the economy of Palestine and its occupation (2006), the one state (2007), 60 Years of Nakba, 60 Years of Resistance (2009), and most recently, the Left in Palestine (2010).

For more information on the SOAS Palestine Society 7th annual conference, Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine: www.soaspalsoc.org

SOAS Palestine Society Organizing Collective is a group of committed students that has undertaken to organize annual academic conferences on Palestine since 2003.

 

[i] Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetics of an Ethnographic Event, Cassell, London, p. 163

[ii] Interview with Benny Morris, Survival of the Fittest, Haaretz, 9. January 2004, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=5412