Justice Minister Yılmaz Tunç denounced the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) for overstepping its authority in a recent ruling in favor of a teacher linked to the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ), which carried out the 2016 coup attempt in Türkiye.
In a message he posted on X (formerly known as Twitter), Tunç said ECtHR’s anti-Türkiye ruling overstepped its authority by assessing evidence.
The minister noted that all judicial authorities in Türkiye had ruled that there was sufficient evidence to prove Yüksel Yalçınkaya’s links to FETÖ and that ECtHR is not a court of appeal.
The ECtHR moved away from its precedents by analyzing evidence, even though in previous rulings it has noted that it does not have the prerogative to do so.
Tunç also said that the European court has shown that it cannot make an impartial ruling as he noted that Türkiye will continue to fight terrorism in line with domestic regulations and international obligations.
ECtHR claimed that Yalçınkaya’s rights had been violated.
The ECtHR, in a damning ruling, said: "anyone who had used ByLock could, in principle, be convicted on that basis alone of membership of an armed terrorist organisation."
The ECtHR said there were currently 8,500 applications of a similar nature and "given that the authorities had identified around 100,000 ByLock users, many more might potentially be lodged."
This was a final verdict issued by the Grand Chamber of the ECtHR, whose rulings are binding for all 46 members of the Council of Europe.
The ECtHR ruling disregards evidence linking the use of the encrypted app to FETÖ.
The rulings shot down the defense by members of the terrorist group who claim they unknowingly downloaded ByLock, possession of which has led to the prosecution of hundreds of people over the past few years. The terrorist group, which tried to seize power in a coup attempt on July 15, 2016, employed the app for secret communications among its military infiltrators long before the coup attempt.
Emir Akpınar, a lawyer who heads the Bar Association of Kayseri in central Türkiye, said the ruling was "scandalous" and "a blow to the Turkish judiciary." Akpınar told Ihlas News Agency (IHA) that the Grand Chamber of the European court had exceeded its authority over the independent courts of Türkiye.
"With this ruling, it viewed itself as a replacement for the Turkish courts. The ECtHR cannot try people and is tasked with examining the compliance of previous rulings with the EU Convention on Human Rights.
"They ignored it and chose to issue a new ruling. In this context, Türkiye may stop being a party to the Council of Europe in the application of the ruling," he said.
