Gezi Trial: Kavala kept in prison despite CoE violation rule

The Istanbul court ruled for the continuation of the imprisonment of civil rights activists Osman Kavala, who has been in prison for more than 4 years without conviction, in Gezi Park Trial where 17 defendants tried for attempting or aiding to overthrow the government.

In the fourth hearing expected to be the final one, Istanbul 13th High Criminal Court adjourned the case to April 22 for the defence to prepare their claims against the prosecutor’s indictment on March 21 upon defendant’s requests. The requests for “extension investigation”, which was the request for reconsidering the evidence, were rejected.

In the case where Osman Kavala is the only detainee, prosecutor Edip Şahiner previously demanded aggravated life sentence for Kavala and Mücella Yapıcı for “attempting to overthrow the Government of the Republic of Turkey by using force and violence” and 15 and 20 years of a prison sentence for six defendants for “aiding” this crime.

Gezi Trial is “unprecedented”

Kavala’s lawyer Köksal Bayraktar stated that the case is “unprecedented” as criticizing the procedure as politically motivated.

“We are dealing with something unprecedented in any criminal case (in Turkey). Although there is a prosecutor’s office, the ministers are also involved in this case. Seven hundred people say they are complainants, not even one of them is brought to court. It is not right to decide when this is the case,” Bayraktar said, journalist Hikmet Adal from Bianet reported from the trial.

Osman Kavala has been in prison without a conviction since 2017 and has been tried with different charges with different files on The Gezi Park and July 15 Coup attempt cases. The cases previously resulted in acquittal are overturned by the higher court, combined and reopened in July 2021. Kavala was accused again in the merged case with a file with minor changes, even though he was released from these cases before.

Kavala: “My detention is completely unlawful”

Despite the ECHR’s rule that Kavala’s detention is a violation and request for his release, the local court insisted on keeping him in prison in the previous three hearings, which resulted in the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe initiating an infringement procedure against Turkey.

Osman Kavala, who did not attend the previous hearing in protest of the legal procedure, participated in this hearing with the Audio-Visual system SEGBİS.

“After my acquittal, I was arrested on two charges. First, on July 15 attempted coup, I was released and then arrested on the espionage charge. No concrete information or document was revealed regarding the espionage charge. The espionage charge was not mentioned in the (prosecutor’s) opinion. That made it evident that my detention on espionage charges is completely unlawful,” Kavala said through an online system.

T24 online news writer Gökçer Tahincioğlu commented that there isn’t any new evidence in the charges brought against Kavala since 2017.

“In this case, the accusations of ‘July 15 and espionage’ and ‘financing the Gezi events’ cited as grounds for the first arrest warrant was repeated. He had been released on both charges. However, each time, the files were reconstructed with minor changes or by overturning the initial decision. Kavala was never questioned by the prosecutor at any stage of these processes,” Tahincioğlu wrote.

“Ankara wants conviction as soon as possible”

Tahincioğlu stated that the hearing is held under the shadow of the allegations that “Ankara is aiming for Kavala, who was not released despite the infringement process by the CoE, to be given prison sentence as soon as possible and to have a status of a ‘convict’ rather than a prisoner.”

“President Erdoğan made several statements that Kavala was guilty, in one of them criticizing the acquittal in the Gezi trial, describing it as an operation aimed at ensuring Kavala’s release. After these comments, a decision to overturn the Gezi trial was given, and the way for the bag lawsuit was opened,” he added.