According to the ECtHR, the actions of the state violated Yücel’s human rights to freedom, security and freedom of expression. Ankara is to pay 13,300 euros in compensation to the journalists.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has condemned Turkey for the imprisonment of the German-Turkish journalist Deniz Yücel. Turkey’s actions violated Yücel’s human rights to freedom and security as well as freedom of expression, according to the verdict, which was announced in writing on Tuesday. Ankara now has to pay 13,300 euros in compensation to the journalists. However, the verdict is not yet final – the litigants can appeal it within three months.
Yücel, 48, was held without charge from February 2017 to February 2018 in the Silivri high-security prison west of Istanbul. Only after a long political tug of war was he released and able to leave the country, while charges were brought against him. In July 2020, the German-Turk was sentenced in absentia to around two years and ten months in prison for terrorist propaganda for the banned Kurdish Workers’ Party PKK.
The verdict included articles from his time as Turkey correspondent world, including an interview with a PKK commander. “This is a political judgment, as the whole story of my arrest was politically motivated,” commented Yücel at the time in one world– Post the verdict. Yücel was acquitted of charges of incitement to hatred and propaganda for the Gülen movement. The procedure is under revision.
Yücel sees his human rights being violated by the detention and therefore appealed to the ECtHR. The arrest of German citizens in Turkey after the attempted coup against President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in July 2016 led to a serious crisis between Berlin and Ankara. Besides Yücel, the most prominent prisoners were the journalist Meşale Tolu and the human rights activist Peter Steudtner. They too have now been allowed to leave the country. Tolu was recently acquitted of all charges against her.