Key facts
- The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ordered Turkey to immediately release Osman Kavala.
- Kavala has been detained since October 2017 and sentenced to life in prison.
- The ECHR found Kavala's detention unlawful and a violation of his rights to a fair trial, freedom of expression, and association.
- The court cited a "systemic problem" in Turkey regarding the detention of political opponents and human rights defenders.
- Turkey previously ignored a 2019 ECHR ruling demanding Kavala's release.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ordered Turkey to immediately release Osman Kavala, an activist and philanthropist who has been detained for nearly a decade. Kavala was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2022 on charges related to the 2013 Gezi Park protests and the 2016 coup attempt, charges that rights groups and Kavala himself maintain are politically motivated.
The ECHR ruled that Kavala's continued detention was unlawful and violated his rights to a fair trial, freedom of expression, and association. The court stated that the measures against him were "predominantly motivated by an ulterior purpose, namely, to punish him for his role in the Gezi Park demonstrations and for expressing his opinions as a human rights defender, and to silence him." The court also deemed his aggravated life sentence to be "inhuman and degrading treatment."
Rights advocates and opposition groups argue that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government increasingly uses the judiciary to target critics. The ECHR highlighted that Kavala's case exposed a "systemic problem" in Turkey concerning the "detention and prosecution of political opponents, human rights defenders and journalists," pointing to "structural shortcomings which affected the guarantees of independence and impartiality of the judiciary." The Turkish government maintains that its courts are independent.
Kavala, 68, became a symbol of a crackdown on civil society after his arrest in October 2017. He and others were accused of orchestrating the 2013 anti-government protests, which challenged Erdogan's leadership. Amnesty International stated that prosecutors falsely alleged the protests aimed to overthrow the government. In 2019, the ECHR had already demanded Kavala's release, calling his detention arbitrary and politically motivated, but Turkey did not comply. He was acquitted in February 2020 but rearrested hours later on new charges related to the 2016 coup attempt. His acquittal was overturned in January 2021, leading to the life sentence in April 2022, which the ECHR has now declared "null and void."
Amnesty International's Eve Geddie urged Turkish authorities to "act to free Osman Kavala immediately and unconditionally." Kavala, born in Paris and educated in the UK, previously ran a cultural centre. Erdogan has accused him of being an agent of George Soros. Turkey's refusal to comply with previous ECHR rulings on Kavala's case creates a significant point of contention between Ankara and Strasbourg. The Council of Europe, which oversees ECHR rulings, may prioritize the Kavala case at a mid-September meeting, potentially debating punitive measures against Turkey.