The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights will hear pleadings on March 25, 2026 in a case brought by the human rights defender Osman Kavala, the Turkey Human Rights Litigation Support Project (TLSP), Human Rights Watch and the International Commission of Jurists said today.
Kavala has been continuously detained since 2017, despite binding judgments from the Court that his detention should end. The three organizations have submitted a third-party intervention to the Court in which, among other arguments, they set out how government undermining of the independence of Türkiye’s judicial system has contributed to the violations against Kavala.
“Osman Kavala’s unlawful and politically motivated detention has been allowed to persist for the best part of a decade in part because Türkiye’s judicial system lacks independence” said Ayşe Bingöl Demir, director of TLSP. “We hope the Court will scrutinize how Türkiye’s ruling political parties have systematically taken steps to capture judicial authority and what that means for human rights.”
Kavala was arrested in October 2017, and on April 25, 2022 was convicted of “attempting to overthrow the government” and sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment (under which prisoners must serve 30 years before being eligible for parole and are detained in harsh security conditions with minimal contact with others) for his alleged role in the 2013 mass protests triggered by an urban transformation plan around Istanbul’s Gezi Park. In 2019 and 2022 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that his detention was arbitrary and motivated by ulterior political purposes. The second judgment was the result of highly exceptional infringement proceedings, initiated by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe when Turkey failed to implement the earlier judgement.
In early 2024, Kavala submitted a new application to the Court, alleging that there had been multiple additional violations of his rights since its 2019 ruling. As of November 2025, the case has been before the court’s Grand Chamber, which is now due to examine the case.
The organizations’ intervention describes the degradation of the independence and impartiality of the judiciary in Türkiye, leading to the capture of judicial authority by the ruling coalition political parties (Justice Development Party – AKP and the Nationalist Movement Party – MHP) – as part of a broader assumption of effective political control over state institutions.
Attacks on judicial independence have included the removal of many legal safeguards designed to protect the independence of the Council of Judges and Prosecutors, the main self-governing body of the judiciary. Positions on the Council were then able to be filled by judges and prosecutors close to the government. Some of those appointed have a track record of misusing anti-terrorism and national security laws as well as non-implementation of Constitutional Court and European Court judgments.
“The Council appears to have become an instrument to unduly influence the judiciary and its decision making, rather than serving as a safeguard for its independence” said Temur Shakirov, director of the ICJ Europe and Central Asia Program. “Its powers are used to create a climate of fear and submission amongst judges and prosecutors, including through arbitrary measures affecting their careers and rights.”
Influence and control over the judiciary has also been secured in the aftermath of the 2016 coup attempt in Turkiye by arbitrarily dismissing thousands of judges and prosecutors, and replacing them with individuals seemingly approved by or aligned with the ruling political parties. Their recruitment has been neither independent from the executive nor based on objective and transparent criteria.
Continued political pressure on and interference with the judiciary in cases concerning perceived dissidents, or others viewed as obstructing the interests of the ruling coalition, has further contributed to the capture and instrumentalization of judicial authority in Türkiye.
Article 13 of the European Convention on Human Rights guarantees the right to an effective remedy for violations of human rights protected by the Convention. The third-party intervention argues that individual applications to Türkiye’s Constitutional Court can no longer be considered an effective remedy, due to the lack of independence of its members from the executive and the resulting ineffectiveness in upholding the human rights of perceived dissidents. The Constitutional Court also lacks a transparent case prioritization policy, contributing to selectivity and facilitating interference with its independence.
The groups’ intervention notes that Türkiye consistently avoids discharging its Convention obligations, particularly in politically sensitive cases, and that judicial and government authorities frequently circumvent national or European Court judgments, and actively undermine their proper implementation.
“Turkish judicial authorities have subverted criminal proceedings, including by unreasonable interpretations of provisions of criminal law and disregard for core procedural rights” said Aisling Reidy, senior legal adviser at Human Rights Watch. “This is also reflected in persistent defiance of European Court of Human Rights judgments and the standards established in its case-law.”
The full intervention can be accessed here.
The Turkey Human Rights Litigation Support Project (TLSP)
Human Rights Watch
The International Commission of Jurists
