The United Nations Human Rights Committee ruled that Turkey has violated the rights of two men by detaining them over their suspected links to US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen's movement, referred to by Ankara as the Fethullah Terrorist Organization (FETO), the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said in a statement on Wednesday
UNITED NATIONS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 29th May, 2019) The United Nations Human Rights Committee ruled that Turkey has violated the rights of two men by detaining them over their suspected links to US-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen's movement, referred to by Ankara as the Fethullah Terrorist Organization (FETO), the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said in a statement on Wednesday."Two Turkish men living in Malaysia were arbitrarily detained and deprived of their right to a fair trial after they were extradited to Turkey and held incommunicado, the United Nations Human Rights Committee concluded in a decision published today in Geneva," the statement said.
In May 2017, Malaysian police detained the two men and then transferred to Turkey without an extradition hearing and a judicial ruling. The men were held in detention until June 2017, when the Turkish authorities imprisoned them in the Denizli correctional facility.
The two men submitted complaints to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights expert body, which determined there was a violation of their right to be free from arbitrary detention.
Ankara has accused FETO of masterminding the 2016 coup attempt in Turkey that resulted in the death of more than 250 people. The Turkish government announced a state of emergency then as a necessary measure to counteract the coup plotters and their supporters.
Since, the authorities have arrested more than 50,000 citizens and 160,000 civil servants, including military personnel, activists, officials, journalists, legal and educational workers.
Gulen, who resides in exile in the United States, has repeatedly denied the accusations of plotting the coup.
