Turkey: Adjournment of court cases involving “Academics for Peace”

Published: 13 December 2017

The first of the court cases involving academics who have been charged for signing a petition criticising the policies of the Turkish government regarding the treatment of Kurds particularly in the South-East of the country opened in Istanbul on Tuesday 4 December 2017.

The outcome of the case is that, following legal submissions, the case has been adjourned to April 2018.

Although the Court did not dismiss the charges against the academics, ETUCE believes that the Court became aware of the level of international attention of this case.

ETUCE Bureau member Mike Jennings, leading the EI/ETUCE delegation noted, “EI/ETUCE is implacably opposed to the prosecution of these academics and regards it as a violation of the principles of freedom of expression and of academic freedom”.

The ETUCE news item published in the run-up to the hearing can be found here.