ECHR Condems Turkey

The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) condemns Turkey for violating Çağrı magazine owner Aziz Özer's freedom of speech. Özer was sentenced to prison regarding two articles published at the magazine.

The Strasbourg court ruled that the articles in question didn't involve a call to violence. Judges said the sentence given to Özer limited his freedom of speech in an unnecessary manner in relation to a democratic society.

Turkey would pay a total of 4 thousand euros to Özer in damages.

Besides this recent case brought before the ECHR, Turkish courts had condemned Özer on several occasions.

On November 2008, an Istanbul court found him guilty regarding two articles publishes in 2003, titled "For whom the AKP shines?" and "We remember the massacre of 19 December". He received one-year imprisonment, which was later converted to a monetary fine.

On another occasion, he was sentenced to 18 months imprisonment. The appeals court deferred the ruling and as a result, the local judge ruled for a 9 thousand TL fine.

On March 2008, another Istanbul court condemned Özer, referring to the Counter Terrorism Law. He received one-year and three months prison sentence. Furthermore, in 2006, Özer had been fined 720 TL regarding two articles appeared on the magazine.(EÖ/AGÜ)