Court of Cassation overturns journalist Aziz Oruç’s prison sentence

* Photo: Aziz Oruç / Facebook (on the right, standing)

Click to read the article in Turkish / Kurdish

The Court of Cassation has overturned the prison sentence of journalist Aziz Oruç, who was sentenced to 6 years, 3 months in prison by the İzmir 8th Heavy Penal Court in 2011.

Oruç was given the prison sentence over a protest demonstration that he attended while he was a student at the Denizli Pamukkale University. He was charged with "committing crimes in the name of the organization as a non-member" as per the Article 220/6 of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK).

The Court of Cassation received the file in 2018 and it has overturned the sentence because the prison sentence was not reduced.

The Court of Cassation's judgement dated June 26, 2021 has indicated that "as per the 2nd sentence of the TCK Article 220/6, a proportional and reasonable reduction should have been applied to the sentence, considering the law, conscience and the scope of the file."

Noting that "the sentence was given by concluding that there was no ground for a reduction in such a way that it did not comply with being or with the scope of the file," the Court has reversed the ruling.

What happened?

36 students, including journalist Aziz Oruç, were sentenced to 226 years in prison in total on the grounds of the protests they joined in 2010-2011.

As the İzmir 8th Heavy Penal Court was closed, the file was transferred to the Denizli 4th Heavy Penal Court. Among the criminal evidence cited in the file was performing folk dances with Kurdish music and attending the opening events of the Democratic Regions Party, March 8 Women's Day and 'tree-planting ceremonies in the name of the organization'." (HA/SD)