Third-Party Intervention in the Case of Academics for Peace Pending Before the ECtHR

IN THE EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS

Application Nos. 72796/16 et al

BETWEEN:
Akın and 42 other
Applications
v
Turkey
Respondent

WRITTEN SUBMISSIONS OF
İNSAN HAKLARI OKULU DERNEĞİ

I. INTRODUCTION

1. These submissions are made by İnsan Hakları Okulu Derneği (the “Intervener”) pursuant to the leave granted by the European Court of Human Rights (“ECtHR”) in accordance with Rule 44§3 of the Rules of the Court.

 

2. Akın and 42 other applications v Turkey concerns the dismissal of the applicants by state of emergency legislative decrees for signing a petition criticizing the security operations and curfew measures in the east and south-east of Turkey.

 

3. Having operated first as an academic platform and then as a registered organisation since 2018, the intervening organisation is dedicated to contributing to democratization efforts in Turkey by facilitating and preserving independent human rights scholarship in Turkey. For this purpose, the Intervener regularly monitors the state of academic freedom in Turkey.

 

4. In these submissions, the Intervener addresses (1) wide-ranging sanctions imposed on the academic signatories of the aforementioned petition, (2) the consequences, and the pecuniary and non-pecuniary damages suffered by signatory academics dismissed directly by state of emergency legislative decrees, and (3) the sweeping chilling effect created by the overall crackdown on freedom of expression of signatory academics on the larger academic community in Turkey.

 

II. BACKGROUND

5. The petition titled “We will not be a party to this crime,” known as the “peace petition,” was published on 11 January 2016. Drafted by Academics for Peace, a network of scholars established in November 2012,[1] the petition was initially signed by 1,128 academics in and outside Turkey. The petition condemned serious human rights violations and breaches of international law committed during the operations of the security forces, and associated round-the-clock curfews imposed in certain eastern and south-eastern cities and towns in Turkey following the collapse of the peace process in July 2015. The petition urged the state to end security operations and curfews, to facilitate the investigation of the crimes committed by the state agents involved in the operations, and to resume peace negotiations.[2]

 

6. Following the publicization of the petition, its signatories were immediately and harshly attacked by top governmental officials, most notably, by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. In several public statements, President Erdoğan targeted the signatory academics with insulting and intimidating remarks such as “traitors,” “tools of the terrorist organization” or “deep dark,” and urged the authorities to take action against them. Pro-government media outlets simultaneously published the names and pictures of academics, calling them “traitors” and “enemies of the nation.”[3]

 

7. The harsh criticisms of the President and top government officials of the petitioners and the media campaign against them were immediately followed by the imposition of a wide range of sanctions by public authorities, as explained below in detail.

 

8. Until 21 January 2016, when the petition and the list of signatures were submitted to the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, the petition continued to attract signatures, bringing the total number of the signatories to 2,210 in and outside Turkey.[4] Of the 2,210 petitioners, 1,223 were researchers of various academic ranks and 156 were PhD candidates at various Turkish universities. At the time of their signature, 697 petitioners worked or studied at universities abroad, whereas 53 petitioners were retired, and 52 petitioners were independent researchers. Of those working at Turkish universities, 75% worked at 57 public universities, and %25 at 42 private universities.[5]

 

9. At least 65 of 72 public and 28 of 42 private universities resorted to at least one sanction against their signatory staff, such as disciplinary investigations, termination or non-renewal of contracts, suspension, and dismissal by emergency legislative decrees.[6]

 

III. WIDE-RANGING SANCTIONS

10. Immediately following the release of the petition on 11 January 2016, the signatories of the peace petition were subjected to wide-ranging sanctions. The imposition and effects of these sanctions have spanned the past six years and continue. All sanctions imposed on the signatory academics, even those which were applied en masse such as criminal investigations and dismissals, were imposed unevenly and randomly.

 

11. In the immediate aftermath of the release of the petition, the signatory academics’ names and photos were published in national newspapers and online news platforms and circulated through several social media platforms accompanied by offensive, insulting, and threatening remarks. Some of the signatories, in particular those residing in small cities and towns, faced direct threats, intimidation, and mobbing in their workplaces or in their social environments.[7] A well-known mafia leader, who was previously convicted for organized criminal activities, Sedat Peker, threatened the signatories in an article published on his personal website, noting that “We will make your blood flow and we will shower in your blood.”[8] These were soon followed by official sanctions by public authorities, which took six main forms:

 

1. Disciplinary proceedings

12. While some universities took no action against their signatory staff, at least 54 public and 22 private universities instigated disciplinary proceedings following the instructions from the Council of Higher Education (“YÖK”).[9] According to the records kept by Academics for Peace, at least 505 signatory academics were subject to a disciplinary investigation. 101 signatory academics were suspended from their university posts during disciplinary investigations.[10] While  disciplinary investigations were concluded with a warning or written reprimand at some universities, in some others, the investigation committees proposed the removal of in total 112 signatory academics from public office.[11]

 

2. Cancellation of research funding, fellowships, study and research visits abroad, and impending promotions

13. In an unknown number of cases, research funding or fellowships were cancelled, or impending promotions were suspended.[12]The Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (“TÜBİTAK”) withdrew the postgraduate scholarships or cancelled research projects of a number of signatories.[13] Some of them were removed from already announced programmes of academic conferences. For some others, permission to leave for academic conferences or for research visits abroad was cancelled.[14]

 

3. Replacement of postgraduate students:

14. Signatories who were doing their Ph.D degree while working at universities in big cities such as Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir as research assistants under the Teaching Staff Training Programme (ÖYP) were forced to take up their positions at universities, where they were supposed to start to work only after the successful completion of their Ph.D programmes.[15] To make this replacement possible, YÖK made a rapid amendment to the regulations concerning the ÖYP.[16] As a result, those signatories who were called upon by their future employers had to immediately leave the cities and universities where they were undertaking their Ph.Ds and move to cities where they would fulfil their compulsory service after the successful completion of their studies.

 

4. Dismissals, resignations, and retirements

15. In at least 18 public and 18 private universities, 89 signatory academics were dismissed by means other than the state of emergency decrees. 72 academics resigned or were forced to resign, 27 others retired or were forced to retire.[17] In several cases, signatory academics were forced to withdraw their signatures by the university administration.[18]

 

5. Criminal proceedings

16. On various dates and in various Turkish cities and towns, 70 signatory academics were arrested and released after testifying before a prosecutor or a judge,[19] with a travel ban imposed on some of them.[20] In some cases, their homes and offices were searched by the police.[21] Four signatories were placed in pre-trial detention for 40 days for reading out a press statement condemning the crackdown on the signatory academics and reaffirming their commitment to the petition.[22]

 

17. In Spring 2016, hundreds of signatory academics were invited to give their statements before the police. After a period of silence, on 23 September 2017, Istanbul Public Prosecutor completed the preparation of an indictment charging them with terror-related crimes. In October 2017, the signatories started to receive notifications for court hearings following the acceptance of the indictment by 57 different assize courts.[23] In total, 822 signatories were indicted. 204 of them were found guilty of terrorist propaganda under Article 7(2) of the Anti-Terror Law or of ‘aiding and abetting a terrorist organisation’ under Article 220/7 of the Turkish Criminal Penal Code in conjunction with Article 314 for signing the petition. They were sentenced to imprisonment ranging from 15 months to 36 months.[24] One signatory academic, in relation to whom a 15-month-prison sentence became final, served two and a half months in prison between 8 May 2019 and 22 July 2019.[25]

 

18. Only after 26 July 2019, when the Turkish Constitutional Court (“TCC”) found the criminal proceedings against the signatories violated their freedom of expression and academic freedom,[26] assize courts began to acquit signatory academics. In the case of those who had already received final verdicts, acquittal decisions were issued upon retrial.[27]

 

6. Dismissals by way of state of emergency legislative decrees

19. Throughout the state of emergency that followed the failed coup attempt of 15 July 2016 and lasted officially for two years, 406 signatories of the peace petition were removed from public service by state of emergency legislative decrees, notwithstanding that the petition was released long before the attempted coup and had no link to it.[28] Alongside over 130,000 civil servants, signatory academics were accused of “membership, association, connection or contact with terrorist organizations or bodies, entities or groups that are deemed to have acted against the national security of the State.” Their names as well as their ID numbers and affiliations were included in the lists appended to the state of emergency legislative decrees ordering their removal from public office.

 

20. The dismissal of 406 signatories were carried out in 11 separate state of emergency decrees, the first being published on 1 September 2016 and the last on 8 July 2018. 55 public and five private universities and four ministries dismissed their signatory staff by way of these decrees.[29] Some private universities, such as Doğuş University and Nişantaşı University dismissed their signatory staff by state of emergency decrees, even though they had already terminated their contract in the immediate aftermath of the publication of the petition. Most universities which adopted this method included all their signatory staff in the lists appended to the state of emergency decrees containing the names of individuals dismissed from public office. Certain universities, such as Marmara University and Yıldız University, even dismissed their resigned or retired staff members by emergency decrees. [30] Having forgotten to include one signatory academic alongside other signatories in the State of Emergency Decree no 686, Marmara University revised this mistake by adding his name in the next state of emergency decree.[31]

 

21. While university administrations were resolute in proceeding to remove their signatory staff through emergency legislative decrees, they were attentive not to punish those who withdrew their signatures. The signatories from Ankara University, Anadolu University and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan University, who withdrew their signatures, were reinstated in their positions in the subsequent emergency legislative decrees, although they had been – probably by mistake – included in the lists appended to the previous state of emergency legislative decrees ordering their dismissal.[32]

 

IV. CONSEQUENCES OF DISMISSALS THROUGH STATE OF EMERGENCY DECREES

22. Dismissals by state of emergency legislative decrees have had consequences beyond straightforward loss of jobs. While some of the consequences of these dismissals were laid out in the state of emergency decrees themselves, some other negative consequences either emanate from de facto measures taken against those dismissed or are the adverse effects of these extraordinary dismissals with far-reaching de jure and de facto

 

1. De jure consequences of dismissals through state of emergency decrees

23. By virtue of the of the state of emergency legislative decrees, dismissals of academics are accompanied by several automatic consequences, aggravating the severity of the intervention in their private and family lives. Below is a list of those consequences that are most relevant to the cases of academics.

 

24. Life-long ban on public sector employment: The most severe of these consequences in terms of the right to work of academics is the life-long ban on public sector employment.[33]

 

25. The ban on public service has been interpreted by public authorities in a way that would foreclose the exercise of certain other professional activities by dismissed civil servants. For example, professional licenses and certificates including the license to act as a lawyer or mediator, certificates to work as a workplace physician and an occupational safety specialist trainer, as well as planning competency documents for city planners were cancelled. These acts officially precluded the dismissed signatories from practicing their profession outside of academia.[34]

 

26. Annulment of passports: State of emergency decrees ordered the annulment of the passports of those dismissed and of their spouses.[35] The cancellation of passports not only prevented the signatory academics from seeking employment or funding opportunities abroad but also led to severe interferences in their and their spouses’ private and family lives.[36]

 

27. Cancellation of applications for associate professor status: State of emergency decrees have also foreclosed the opportunity for dismissed academics to continue their academic progression without an institutional affiliation. An emergency decree adopted in 2017 blocked their applications for associate professor status and ordered the cancellation of their previously lodged applications.[37]

 

2. De facto consequences of dismissals by way of state of emergency decrees

28. Stigmatizing note on social security records: Alongside the disclosure of their names, affiliations, and ID numbers through the publication of the state of emergency decrees in the Official Gazette, a permanent note reading “Removed from public office (by state of emergency legislative decree)” has been inserted on the social security records of those dismissed.

 

29. Ban on employment at private universities: YÖK interpreted the Article 8 added to the Law No 2547 in 1984 concerning the disqualification to hold public office as involving the dismissals ordered by the state of emergency legislative decrees, thereby precluding the employment of signatory academics in private universities.[38] Under the said article, “those who are banned from working at higher education institutions or those who are removed from office by way of disciplinary investigation shall not take office at private higher education institutions.”

 

30. Denial of consular services: As a de facto consequence of the cancellation of passports, those who are or were outside Turkey, their spouses, and in some cases also their children, were denied any type of consular services, as the Turkish consulates and embassies refused to deliver services to those whose passports were cancelled. Depending on their individual and family situation, this led to wide-ranging legal and personal hardships both in their host countries and in Turkey.[39]

 

31. Exclusion from research funding opportunities and academic publications: TÜBİTAK revised its research funding applications for scientific projects to exclude the applications from dismissed academics.[40] It has also urged the removal of dismissed academics from editorial boards and publishing lists of nationally indexed journals and ordered the cancellation of their referee positions.[41]

 

32. Interventions in the right to property: In some cases, dismissed academics qualified for retirement faced difficulties obtaining their retirement pension bonus or encountered considerable delays in obtaining their pensions.[42] Dismissed signatories also had to endure other types of arbitrary practices, such as the closure of or denial of access to bank accounts and cancellation of credit cards following their dismissals.[43]

 

3. Other adverse effects of dismissals through state of emergency decrees

33. Dismissals by state of emergency legislative decrees and their de jure and de facto consequences have engendered serious violations of socio-economic rights, significant personal and familial adverse effects, as well as enduring psychological effects. It is impossible to identify in full their individual effect on each signatory academic as they vary depending on one’s personal and familial conditions. What is provided below is a list of the most widely encountered problems by signatory academics.

 

34. Stigmatization: The summary dismissal of signatory academics for alleged “membership, belonging, connection or contact” with terrorist organizations through publicly available lists containing their names, affiliations, and ID numbers has led to their stigmatization. This stigmatization has been exacerbated by the entry of the aforementioned note on their social security records. Not only have their social relationships been affected, but also their employment opportunities in the private sector have been drastically curtailed due to this stigma. In some cases, the stigma attached to them has extended to their family members, as their employment opportunities or employment status were also affected by the dismissal of the signatory academics by emergency decrees.[44]

 

35. Economic hardships: Having been deprived of the opportunity to pursue an academic career, signatory academics had to look for non-academic jobs for which they had no previous experience. The stigmatizing note on their social security records further reduced their job prospects and pushed the academics to accept precarious work without social security, which, in some cases, had a devastating impact on their families, as the deprivation of social security also extends to the non-working family members.[45]

 

36. A recent survey conducted by a group of researchers assembled under the auspices of The Human Rights Foundation of Turkey (“TIHV Akademi”) has found that one in seven signatories do not have an income-generating job and 39% do not have a full-time job. More than 58% of them have an income lower than the average income of academics in the country, 14.2% of them have an income less than the minimum wage, and 6.6% of them have no income. 27% of the survey participants reported that they are dependent on financial support from family, friends, or various institutions.[46]

 

37. Obstacles to academic development: Signatory academics have been confronted with several obstacles to develop their academic skills, to continue their research or to disseminate it. In addition to their exclusion from academic events, publications, academic committees, TIHV Akademi has observed that having lost their connection to the universities, signatory academics have also faced major difficulties in continuing their scientific research. Of those participating in their survey, 63.8% reported having difficulty in accessing resources for academic work, such as printed publications, online databases, and other field-specific resources. In specific fields, such as clinical medicine or arts, continuing their research has become practically impossible due to their inability to access laboratories or patients. Half of the survey participants reported that their academic work became “fragmented and irregular.” 60% of them said they lost their motivation to continue their research.[47]

 

38. Impairment of social bonds: The dismissals have also had significant impact on their inter-personal, familial, and social bonds. According to another survey conducted by TIHV Akademi, following their dismissal, almost 37% of the survey participants had to move to another neighbourhood or to another city for economic reasons or concerns about their safety.[48] Some others were either forced to leave the country to find a job and/or safety or were forced to stay abroad for the same reasons.[49] Both those who could not seek opportunities abroad and those who could not return to the country because of the cancellation of their passports have had to endure significant economic, personal, and familial hardships.

 

39. Physical and mental health problems: The disruption to or severing of links with their work, social and cultural environment have led to important physical and mental health problems. Of the academics who participated in the 2019 survey by TIHV Akademi, 47.4% were diagnosed with depression, 31% with anxiety disorders, 20.7% with post-traumatic stress disorders, 12.1% with musculoskeletal diseases, and 9.5% with hypertension.[50] Furthermore, 10% of the survey participants reported that they do not have a health insurance, while 19.8% reported that they benefit from their spouse’s or parents’ insurance as their dependants.[51]

 

V. CHILLING EFFECT OF THE SANCTIONS ON ACADEMIC FREEDOM

40. Throughout the state of emergency, 6,055 academics, constituting 4,57% of the total number of academic staff at Turkish universities were removed from office by state of emergency legislative decrees.[52] The dismissal of 406 signatory academics constitute only one part of total dismissals. Yet, their case has been crucial in the emergence and entrenchment of an unprecedented climate of fear at Turkish universities.[53] Signatory academics have been so harshly targeted merely because of expressing their views through a petition on a matter of high political and public significance. As the indictment against signatory academics and recent decisions of the State of Emergency Inquiry Commission have also confirmed, they have been targeted because they signed the petition in their capacity as academics. The crackdown on the freedom of expression of signatory academics over the past six years as well as the uneven and random application of various sanctions and associated uncertainties had, therefore, a devastating chilling effect on the exercise of freedom of expression and academic freedom in the country.

 

41. Fear and anxiety: A 2019 survey conducted by the Intervener on the state of academic freedom during the state of emergency has shown how fear and anxiety became pervasive among academics as well as students in Turkey.[54] Of those who participated in the survey, 34% reported that they felt under pressure when putting together course content or giving lectures and that they avoided raising “sensitive issues” in the classes;[55] 54% reported that they did not feel free when conveying their ideas in academic publications and 57% at academic events.[56] The survey has also shown that 84% of the participants feared sharing their views via social media, while 63% avoided sharing views via social media.[57] Alongside the fear of persecution, a strong fear for losing their jobs underlaid these anxieties. Of those participated in the survey, more than half of the participants (55%) expressed concern about losing their jobs, and almost half of them (49%) specifically indicated that they feared being dismissed by an emergency legislative decree.[58] On the part of the graduate students, such fears led them to refrain from addressing “sensitive issues” in their research and dissertations.[59]

 

42. Self-censorship: Such fears are well substantiated, given the massive scale of the purges throughout the state of emergency, undermining job security as well as the constitutional safeguards of academic freedom and freedom of expression. Alongside other state of emergency practices such as security investigations and increased prosecutions, both the scale and wide-ranging consequences of the dismissals by way of emergency legislative decrees contributed to the emergence of an academic environment where the concerns surrounding the preservation of present positions prevailed not only over their enthusiasm for research and teaching but also over ethical sensibilities that should guide knowledge production, research, and teaching activities in academia.[60]

 

43. A 2021 survey of the Intervener has found that self-censorship practices have increased across all domains of academic activities, including lectures, research, publications, thesis supervision, and academic events throughout the state of emergency, but they have not remained limited to that period. The survey finds that self-censorship practices have become more prevalent in relation to certain “taboo themes” such as the Kurdish issue, Armenian Genocice and LGBTQI+ rights. But during and after the state of emergency, self-censorship practices have also extended to academic criticism of the social, political, and economic policies of the government.[61] Revising the titles of dissertations covering these issues to render them unnoticeable by the Higher Education Council, refraining from using examples from Turkey as course material or during lectures, creating course content with a focus on technical issues that would help avoid critical and analytical discussions have been among the self-censorship strategies most commonly resorted to by academics during and in the post-state of emergency period.[62]

 

VI. CONCLUSION

44. As shown above, in the past six years, signatories of the peace petition have encountered wide-ranging sanctions, including dismissals by state of emergency legislative decrees. With their far-reaching legal, personal, familial, economic, and social consequences, these dismissals should be seen as amounting to far more than a mere loss of job or removal from public office. They have resulted in what the Monitoring Committee of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe likened to a “civilian death.”[63]

 

45. Dismissals by state of emergency decrees resemble the lustration practices in the context of transition to democracy in several Eastern European states. Nevertheless, the removals from public office in the context of the state of emergency in Turkey have undoubtedly given rise to heavier consequences than those the ECtHR has so far dealt with in its lustration case law.[64] The present case brings before the court a form of lustration unprecedented in its nature and scale. This application does not concern the dismissal of applicants for the administrative power they held and their complicity in human rights violations. What is at stake in the present case is rather the mass dismissal of researchers from various academic ranks for merely expressing their harsh but entirely peaceful criticism of the Turkish government’s security policies in south-eastern Turkey. It is, therefore, necessary for the ECtHR to make its assessment as regards both the interference in the applicants’ rights and the far-reaching consequences of that interference by taking the sui generis character of the case into consideration.

 

46. Despite the official lifting of the state of emergency in July 2018, and despite the TCC’s July 2019 judgment establishing that the act of signing the peace petition was an exercise of freedom of expression, the civil and political rights of signatory academics dismissed by state of emergency legislative decrees have not been restored. This delay in restoring their rights has not only aggravated the already severe consequences of dismissals for signatory academics themselves but also reinforced the fears prevalent in Turkish academia, leading to severe censorship and self-censorship practices. Furthermore, the massive crackdown on the signatories of the peace petition cannot be understood in isolation from the larger political context in Turkey, whereby critical views, including but not limited to those produced and expressed through academic activities, are systematically punished and intimidated with an aim to reduce people to silence.[65]

 

47. The TCC has held that academics’ ability to challenge the prevailing views with regard to the most sensitive political matters, might play a vital role in a society towards solving its problems, even if they do not fall under their expertise in a technical sense.[66] The political context within which the signatory academics signed and released the peace petition had made it all the more vital and urgent to challenge the prevailing views promoted by the government authorities and mainstream media, since the government authorities themselves were simultaneously curbing by various means of intimidation opportunities to circulate news from the ground or express critical views on the security operations and curfews.[67] The peace petition was an effort on the part of its signatories, in their capacity as academics, to put to the public a different perspective on a matter of high political and public importance. [68] The significance of a free public and political debate in the context of the conflict between the Turkish state and the Kurdistan Workers Party (“the PKK”) has been acknowledged in a long strain of cases against Turkey by the ECtHR.[69] Linking the act of the signatory academics to terrorism and punishing them with wide-ranging sanctions are, therefore, also a flagrant disregard of the ECtHR’s well-established case law.

 

48. In the light of the foregoing, the restoration of the rights of dismissed signatory academics is of crucial importance and urgency not only for the applicants themselves but also for the restoration of a free academic environment in Turkey in line with the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers’ recommendations to the member states: “University staff and/or students should be free to teach, learn and research without the fear of disciplinary action, dismissal or any other form of retribution.”[70] It is equally vital towards ending the practice of criminalizing efforts to find a peaceful solution to the conflict between the Turkish state and the PKK.

 

[1] See: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/1.

[2] For the full text of the petition, see: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/63.

[3] For an extensive overview of such reactions both from the governmental officials and pro-government media, see: TIHV Akademi, Barış için Akademisyenler Vakasının Kısa Tarihi, 2019, pp. 4-9. Available at: https://www.tihvakademi.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Barisicinakademisyenlervakasi.pdf.

[4] TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali – Akademik Ortamın Tahribatı Üzerine Bir İnceleme, Türkiye İnsan Hakları Yayınları Vakfı 126, p. 57. Available at: https://tihvakademi.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/universiteninolaganustuhaliy.pdf.

[5] Ibid.

[6] Ibid, p. 62.

[7] TIHV Akademi, Akademisyen İhraçları – Hak İhlalleri Kayıplar ve Güçlenme Süreçleri, Türkiye İnsan Hakları Yayınları Vakfı 127, 2019, pp. 39-42. Available at: https://tihvakademi.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/akademisyenihraclariy.pdf.

[8] Sedat Peker was indicted for this publicly expressed threat. However, he was acquitted by the 20th Assize Court in July 2018. See: https://bianet.org/english/law/199221-sedat-peker-acquitted-of-trial-of-threatening-academics

[9] By a written statement of 13 January 2016, YÖK ordered the universities to take action against their signatory staff members. See, TIHV Akademi, Barış için Akademisyenler Vakasının Kısa Tarihi, p. 13.

[10] See: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/314.

[11] See: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/314; TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali, p. 68. These proposals were not enforced, but those academics were later dismissed by state of emergency legislative decrees.

[12] Academics for Peace, Report by Solidarity Group, Last Update: December 2019, p. 58. See: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/sites/default/files/Bakreporteng041219.pdf.

[13] Ibid.

[14] TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali, pp. 55-56. For details, see: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/sites/default/files/Bakraportr041219.pdf.

[15] ÖYP was first set up in 2002 with an aim to address the problem of insufficient numbers of teaching staff at provincial universities. According to what was initially planned, the Ph.D students would be placed in permanent positions at provincial universities after completing their Ph.D programmes. See, Academics for Peace, Report by Solidarity Group, p. 9.

[16] TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali, pp. 69-70.

[17] Ibid, pp. 70-72. Also see: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/314.

[18] TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali, p. 73.

[19] See: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/314.

[20] See, Human Rights Watch, “Turkey: Academics Jailed for Signing Petition,” 16 March 2016. See, https://www.hrw.org/news/2016/03/16/turkey-academics-jailed-signing-petition. In one such case, it took 5 years for the TCC to find a violation of the right to private life. See, TCC, Latife Akyüz, no. 2016/50822, 7 September 2021.

[21] Human Rights Watch, “Turkey: Academics Jailed for Signing Petition.”

[22] TIHV Akademi, Barış İçin Akademisyenler Vakasının Kısa Tarihi, p. 17.

[23] Esra Demir-Gürsel, “On the Crime Allegedly Committed by the Academics for Peace: Propaganda for a Terrorist Organization or Degrading the State of Turkish Republic?” (AfP Hypotheses, 11 December 2017) https://afp.hypotheses.org/236.

[24] See: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/314.

[25] See: https://www.frontlinedefenders.org/en/case/member-academics-peace-z%C3%BCbeyde-f%C3%BCsun-%C3%BCstel-due-begin-prison-sentence.

[26] TCC, Zübeyde Füsun Üstel ve Diğerleri, no. 2018/17635, 26 July 2019.

[27] TIHV, “Barış için Akademisyenler Güncel Durum Raporu,” 24 August 2020, pp. 2-3, available at: https://tihv.org.tr/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/BAK_Guncel_Durum_Raporu_Agustos_2020.pdf.

[28] See: https://barisicinakademisyenler.net/node/314.

[29] TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali, p. 62.

[30] Ibid, p. 74. See also, Academics for Peace, Report by Solidarity Group, p. 57.

[31] See, Academics for Peace, Report by Solidarity Group, p. 38.

[32] The list prepared by Eğitim-Sen is on file with the Intervener.

[33] All emergency decrees adopted throughout the state of emergency with appended lists of dismissed civil servants contained a provision to that effect. E.g., see Article 1 of the State of Emergency Legislative Decree no. 686 of 7 February 2017.

[34] TIHV Akademi, Akademisyen İhraçları, p. 43. The obstacle to act as a lawyer was lifted only after a TCC judgment from July 2020. See, TCC, Tamer Mahmutoğlu, no. 2017/38953, 23 July 2020.

[35] E.g., see Article 1 of the State of Emergency Legislative Decree no. 686 of 7 February 2017. In October 2019, lifting of the restrictions on passports have become possible under certain conditions following an amendment made to the Passport Act. See, Article 7 added to the Passport Act numbered 5682. Regarding the cancellation of the spouses’ passports, the TCC annulled the relevant emergency decree provision in July 2019. See, TCC, 2016/205, Docket no. 2019/63, 24 July 2019, published on 31 October 2019 in the Official Gazette no. 30934.

[36] TIHV Akademi, Akademisyen İhraçları, pp. 35, 49-50, 63, 85, and 92. An application concerning the cancellation of the passport of a signatory academic’s spouse is pending before the ECtHR. See, Emrah Gürsel v Turkey, no. 30520/19 (Date of application: 14 May 2019).

[37] See, Article 4 of the State of Emergency Legislative Decree No. 683 of 23 January 2017.

[38] YÖK has recently dismissed the applications from several signatory academics with a request to lift the ban on the employment at private universities on this ground. These decisions by YÖK are on file with the Intervener.

[39] An application concerning the passport cancellations is pending before the ECtHR, where one of the applicants, Zeynep Kıvılcım, had to endure such inability to access to the consular services in Germany: Alphan Telek against Turkey and two other applications, nos. 66763/17, 66767/17, 15891/18 (Communicated on 26 September 2018).

[40] See: https://www.tubitak.gov.tr/sites/default/files/283/cagri-duyurusu-2211b-2020.pdf.

[41] “TÜBİTAK: Atılan akademisyenlere dergi de yaptırmayın!” (Duvar, 23 March 2017) https://www.gazeteduvar.com.tr/gundem/2017/03/23/tubitak-atilan-akademisyenlere-dergi-de-yaptirmayin; “Derginizde İhraç Edilen Akademisyen Varsa Bildirin!” (Birgün, 23 March 2017) https://www.birgun.net/haber/derginizde-ihrac-edilen-akademisyen-varsa-bildirin-152318.

[42] TIHV Akademi, Akademisyen İhraçları, pp. 44-45.

[43] Ibid, pp. 45-46, 55. See also, Academics for Peace, Report by Solidarity Group, p. 39.

[44] TIHV Akademi, Akademisyen İhraçları, p. 38.

[45] Ibid, p. 44.

[46] TIHV Akademi, Barış İçin Akademisyenler: Güncel Durum, 19 Kasım 2021, p. 4-8. Available at: https://tihvakademi.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/BAK_Rapor_Kasim_2021.pdf.

[47] Ibid, p. 5-10.

[48] TIHV Akademi, Akademisyen İhraçları, pp. 93-95.

[49] TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali, p. 56.

[50] TIHV Akademi, Akademisyen İhraçları, p. 112.

[51] TIHV Akademi, Barış İçin Akademisyenler: Güncel Durum, 19 Kasım 2021, p. 6.

[52] TIHV Akademi, Üniversitenin Olağanüstü Hali, pp. 105-106.

[53] Demet Sayınta, OHAL Sonrası Akademik Hak İhlallerini İzleme Raporu, İnsan Hakları Okulu, 2021, pp. 5, 15.

[54] İnan Özdemir Taştan & Aydın Ördek, OHAL Döneminde Türkiye’de Akademik Özgürlükler Araştırması Raporu, 2019. Also see, Human Rights Watch, “Turkey: Government Targeting Academics: Dismissals, Prosecutions Create Climate of Fear,” 14 May 2018, available at: https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/05/14/turkey-government-targeting-academics

[55] Taştan & Ördek, OHAL Döneminde Türkiye’de Akademik Özgürlükler Araştırması Raporu, p. 35.

[56] Ibid, pp. 51, 54.

[57] Ibid, p. 69.

[58] Ibid, pp. 74-75.

[59] Ibid, p. 142.

[60] For an extensive overview see Sayınta, OHAL Sonrası Akademik Hak İhlallerini İzleme Raporu.

[61] Ibid, p. 78.

[62] Ibid, pp. 28-29.

[63] Committee on the Honouring of Obligations and Commitments by Member States of the Council of Europe (Monitoring Committee), “The Functioning of Democratic Institutions in Turkey,” Doc. 14282, 5 April 2017, para. 16.

[64]  Among others, see Polyakh and Others v Ukraine, no. 58812/15, 17 October 2019; Karajanov v the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, no. 2229/15, 6 April 2017; Ivanovski v the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, no. 29908/11, 21 January 2016; Sõro v Estonia, no. 22588/08, 3 September 2015; Naidin v Romania, no. 38162/07,  21 October 2014; Bobek v Poland, no. 68761/01, 24 October 2006; Matyjek v Poland (admissibility), no. 38184/03, 30 May 2006; Sidabras ve Džiautas v Lithuania (admissibility), nos. 55480/00 and 59330/00, 21 October 2003.

[65] For civil society, see Amnesty International, “Government Crackdown Suffocating Civil Society Through Deliberate Climate of Fear,” 26 April 2018, available at: https://www.amnesty.eu/news/turkey-government-crackdown-suffocating-civil-society-through-deliberate-climate-of-fear-1116/; for media, see Human Rights Watch, “Silencing Turkey’s Media,” 2016, available at: https://www.hrw.org/sites/default/files/report_pdf/turkey1216_web.pdf; for writers and artists, see PEN America, “Cracking Down on Creative Voices: Turkey’s Silencing of Writers, Intellectuals, and Artists Five Years After the Failed Coup,” 2021, available at: https://publishingperspectives.com/2021/06/pen-americas-new-report-on-turkey-five-years-after-the-failed-coup/.

[66] Zübeyde Füsun Üstel ve Diğerleri, para. 112.

[67] See, OHCHR, “Report on the human rights situation in South-East Turkey, July 2015 to December 2016,” February 2017, pp. 20-21; Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, “Memorandum on freedom of expression and media freedom in Turkey,” 15 February 2017, CommDH(2017)5, paras. 29, 62 and 76.

[68] See, mutatis mutandis, Başkaya and Okçuoğlu v Turkey, no. 23536/94, 8 July 1999, para. 65; Sürek v Turkey (no. 4), no. 24762/94, 8 July 1999, para. 58.

[69] Among others, see Sürek v Turkey (no. 1) [GC], no. 26682/95, 8 July 1999; Başkaya and Okçuoğlu v  Turkey, no. 23536/94, 8 July 1999; Özgür Gündem v Turkey, no. 23144/93, 16 March 2000; Şener v Turkey, no. 26680/95, 18 July 2000; Kanat and Bozan v Turkey, no. 13799/04, 21 October 2008; Ergin and Keskin v Turkey (no. 1), no. 50273/99, 16 June 2005; Falakoğlu and Saygılı v Turkey, no. 11461/03, 19 December 2006; Yıldız and Taş v Turkey (no. 2), no. 77642/01, 19 December 2006; Yıldız and Taş v Turkey (no. 3), no. 477/02, 19 December 2006; Yıldız and Taş v Turkey (no. 4), no. 3847/02, 19 December 2006; Çapan v Turkey (no. 2), no. 29849/02, 26 April 2007; Demirel and Ateş v Turkey (no. 3), no. 11976/03, 9 December 2008; Buran v Turkey, no. 984/02, 17 June 2008; Ürper and Others v Turkey, no. 14526/07, 20 October 2009; Yavuz and Yaylalı v Turkey, no. 12606/11, 17 December 2013; Güler and Uğur v Turkey, no. 31706/10, 2 December 2014; Yağmurdereli v Turkey, no. 29590/96, 4 June 2002.

[70] Recommendation CM/Rec(2012)7 of the Committee of Ministers to member States on the responsibility of public authorities for academic freedom and institutional autonomy, adopted by the Committee of Ministers on 20 June 2012 at the 1146th meeting of the Ministers’ Deputies, para. 5.