Istanbul Palace of Justice protest at football fans accused of coup plot, 2014. Demotix/ Avni Kantan. All rights reserved.Jailing journalists has been one of the hallmarks of Turkey’s poor human rights record, a kind of shorthand for describing the country’s authoritarian tendencies and flawed justice system. But in the run up to a highly contested general election in June, that treatment has been extended to judges and prosecutors who issue decisions the government doesn’t like.
The Justice and Development Party (AKP) government, under the shadow of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has been accusing these judges of acting as members of an armed organization attempting a coup. Other judges friendly to the government have been sending them off to jail while there is an investigation.
Over the past month, three judges and four prosecutors have been put in pre-trial detention, all as a result of decisions they made while discharging their professional duties rather than any evidence of criminal activity. Another four prosecutors barred from the profession during May may be next to see the inside of a cell. The shared feature of these cases is that the decisions that led to their arrests were all on issues pertaining directly or indirectly to allegations of unlawful activity implicating the Erdoğan-dominated government.
