Paris-Sana
The European Court of Human Rights renewed its condemnation of the Turkish regime today for violating the rights of journalists who were placed in pretrial detention after they published emails from a minister that appeared on the site WikiLeaks.
According to Agence France-Presse, the court, the highest judicial body of the Council of Europe, said in a statement today, “Putting critical voices in pretrial detention leads to multiple negative effects for arrested persons and for society as a whole,” adding that imposing a measure leads to deprivation of liberty as was the case in this case. It has a great impact on freedom of expression by intimidating civil society and silencing dissenting voices.
The Turkish authorities had detained journalists Tunka Ilker Ugretan and Maher Qanat, who are known for their opinions opposing the policies of the Turkish regime led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan, after they published emails of Minister Berat Albayrak, Erdogan's son-in-law, which appeared in 2016 on the WikiLeaks website.
The judges of the European Court of Human Rights unanimously considered that the Turkish regime violated at the same time (the right to freedom and security of journalists whose arrest was not based on reasonable grounds for suspicion of committing a violation) and their freedom of expression that they were denied (because of their journalistic activities).
