MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 04th July, 2020) A Turkish court on Friday convicted Amnesty Turkey's honorary chair Taner Kilic, ex-director Idil Eser and two other human rights defenders on terrorism-related charges.
The four were among 10 activists arrested during a conference in an Istanbul hotel in summer 2017. Kilic was charged with being a member of a terrorist organization, while Eser, Ozlem Dalkiran and Gunal Kursun were accused of assisting it.
"Taner was sentenced for 6 years and 3 months. Idil, Ozlem and Gunal were all convicted for 25 months for assisting a terrorist organisation," Amnesty International said in a statement.
There have been no detention orders issued for the four convicted and they will not be jailed pending their appeals, the rights pressure group said, but the appeals process could take years.
Andrew Gardner, Amnesty International's Turkey researcher who observed the hearing, said Turkey was punishing activists for standing up for human rights. He argued that the three-year trial was a "politically motivated attempt to silence independent voices."
Thousands of activists, journalists, academics, public employees and members of the military were detained or dismissed in the years after the 2016 coup attempt for being allegedly tied to what Ankara claims is an illegal network run by exiled cleric Fethullah Gulen to depose his former ally, President Tayyip Erdogan.
