Published on 17 June 2024
SECOND SECTION
Application no. 1414/24
Sezgin KARTAL
against Türkiye
lodged on 21 December 2023
communicated on 27 May 2024
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the pre-trial detention of the applicant, a journalist, on suspicion of membership of an armed terrorist organisation (the PKK (Workers’ Party of Kurdistan)), on the basis of a number of tweets he posted on X and a photograph found by police officers during a search on which a person holding an automatic weapon in northern Syria resembled him.
The applicant complains that his pre-trial detention was in breach of Article 5 §§ 1 and 3 and that this detention, as well as the criminal proceedings brought against him, violated Article 10 of the Convention.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
1. Was the applicants’ pre-trial detention compatible with the requirements of Article 5 § 1 of the Convention? In particular, can the applicant be considered to have been detained on the basis of “a reasonable suspicion” that he had committed an offence, within the meaning of Article 5 § 1 (c) of the Convention (see, in particular, Fox, Campbell and Hartley v. the United Kingdom, 30 August 1990, § 32, Series A no. 182), taking into account, in particular, Article 100 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, which requires “concrete evidence demonstrating the existence of strong suspicions” as to the commission of the offence?
2. Was the applicant’s pre-trial detention compatible with the requirements of Article 5 § 3 of the Convention? In particular, did the courts, which ordered his initial pre-trial detention, and which examined the objection lodged against that decision, fulfil their obligation to provide relevant and sufficient grounds for the deprivation of liberty in question (see, in particular, Buzadji v. the Republic of Moldova [GC], no. 23755/07, § 102, 5 July 2016)?
3. Has there been an interference with the applicant’s freedom of expression, in particular his right to impart information and ideas, within the meaning of Article 10 § 1 of the Convention, on account of his pre‑trial detention and the criminal proceedings brought against him? If so, was that interference prescribed by law and necessary in terms of Article 10 § 2 (see, mutatis mutandis, Nedim Şener v. Turkey, no. 38270/11, §§ 92‑119, 8 July 2014)?