International Reactions

The Council of Europe’s (COE) expert body on legal and constitutional affairs, the Venice Commission, on Friday said Turkey’s emergency decree laws, which were passed in the wake of a failed coup attempt in 2016, go beyond what is permitted by international standards and the Turkish Constitution. According to a press release from the COE, […]

Imprisoned pro-Kurdish People’s Democratic Party (HDP) Co-chairs Selahattin Demirtaş and Figen Yüksekdağ have been nominated for the prestigious Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought given by the European Parliament (EP), the EP press service reported on Wednesday. The reason for the nomination of the imprisoned leaders was that “[t]hey are the symbols of the repression

Amnesty International’s (AI) local branch in UK’s Kirklees distict launched a photo exhibition in solidarity with whom it called Turkey’s silenced voices, on Sept 29. “The pews of the town Centre Church will be filled with photographs and information relating to those journalists who have been detained in a clampdown by the Turkish state following

The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan HRCP has called for the immediate release of ex-director of a Turkish schools in Pakistan, Mesut Kaçmaz, and his family who were abducted in the wee hours of Wednesday. According to the Nation, HRCP urged Pakistani government to immediately release the Kacmaz family and desist from deporting them; as there

Scholars, academic staff and students across the globe continue to face threats while Turkey has been singled out as the home to the highest number of reported attacks, according to a recent report. In its Tuesday report, titled Free to Think 2017, SAR documented 257 attacks in 35 countries where higher education participants, whether be

The head of the German Bar Association (DAV), Ulrich Schellenberg, said the rule of law no longer exists in Turkey, warning German lawyers about the possibility of being arrested in the country, Deutsche Welle reported on Friday. “There is no rule of law in Turkey anymore. There is no presumption of innocence. There is no

Turkey came first in the Twitter’s censorship index by content removal requests that the microblogging company received worldwide in the first half of 2017. A total of 1,995 content removal requests were filed by Turkey’s government agencies including police and other institutions, making up 37 percent of the total number of such requests made globally

Turkish state has been tolerating post-coup abductions even though its involvement has yet to be backed up with hard evidence, according to online news portal Politico’s Europe edition. “There is no hard evidence of the Turkish state’s involvement in the recently documented disappearances, and the identities of the kidnappers remain a mystery. But the case of

The asylum requests of 196 Turkish nationals with diplomatic passports have been approved by Germany, Deutsche Welle reported on Tuesday. In response to a parliamentary question by Left Party, Germany’s Interior Ministry said 196 Turkish nationals, who applied for asylum in Germany following a botched coup attempt in July, 2016, were recognized. According to the

The New York-based Human Rights Foundation (HRF) on Tuesday took out an advertisement in the Metro New York newspaper criticizing Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who is attending the UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York, for his crackdown on opposition in Turkey. In a tweet from @HRF on Tuesday, the rights group said, “We