‘Honors of Rights Defenders Must be Restored’

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Ahead of the second hearing of the trial of 11 rights defenders who have faced prosecution for attending a meeting on security of rights defenders in Büyükada, rights defenders made a statement in front of İstanbul Courthouse in Çağlayan.

Feray Salman from the Human Rights Joint Platform read out in the statement that “The unlawful case brought against the rights defenders must be immediately dropped, our friends must be released and honors of the rights defenders must be restored”.

The statement emphasized that “The rights defenders have been detained in a police raid without any reasonable doubt or solid evidence”.

The statement said:

“Despite our bittersweet joy before delayed compensation of unlawfulness to which our eight rights defender friends were released, two of whom on probation, were subjected to, some of our concerns continue. This trial still continuing proves our worries rights in terms of the unlawfulness that our friends have been subjected to, and the gap between justice and law.

“We demand that honors of our 11 rights defender friends who have been tried be restored as soon as possible, and we want to believe that the court will establish the truth!”

Three rights defenders to be heard

In today’s hearing, two rights defenders who were not heard in the first hearing, Şeyhmus Özbekli and Nejat Taştan, and Amnesty Amnesty Turkey Executive Board Chair Lawyer Taner Kılıç who has been kept in İzmir Şakran Prison since June 9, 2017, will be hard.

The file opened against Kılıç was combined with this case in the first hearing on October 25. (EA/TK)