Osman Kavala, who was convicted in the Gezi Park trial, issued a written statement on Sunday marking his ninth year in prison, ANKA news agency and Serbestiyet reported. The statement was published on the "Freedom for Osman Kavala" (Osman Kavala’ya özgürlük) website, according to ANKA.
Kavala wrote that when he was first arrested, he believed his detention was a mistake that would soon be corrected. "I was wrong," he said, according to both reports.
‘Outlandish claims’
In the statement, Kavala said the Gezi trial had initially ended in acquittals because of a lack of evidence, but that he was kept in detention on an espionage charge which he described as fabricated, despite a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). The acquittals were later overturned and heavy sentences were handed down to him and other defendants, he said.
He recalled the accusations against him, namely that he had steered the Taksim Solidarity platform towards an uprising and financed protesters, and said "outlandish claims" had been put forward to make up for the absence of evidence, according to the reports.
Kavala said that in its latest ruling the ECtHR had found that the measures restricting his liberty amounted to a clear denial of justice. In his view, he wrote, this also showed that ethical principles had been ignored.
‘Most of my healthy years’
Kavala said he was 60 years old when he entered prison, and that he had spent behind bars most of the years in which he could have remained active in civil society, as well as a large part of the years in which he could have lived in good health.
Despite this, he said he still believed he might see developments towards the establishment of the rule of law in Türkiye. If lessons were drawn from the Gezi trial and the injustice he had suffered, that would be a source of consolation to him, he wrote, according to ANKA and Serbestiyet.
Sources
- Osman Kavala’dan cezaevinde 9. yıl mesajı: ‘İlk tutuklandığımda bunun düzeltileceğini düşünüyordum, yanılmışım’ (ANKA)
- Osman Kavala 9 yıldır cezaevinde: ‘Sağlıklı yaşayabileceğim yılların önemli bir kısmını cezaevinde geçirmiş oldum’ (Serbestiyet)
- Osman Kavala’nın tutukluluğunun 9. yılı: ‘Girdiğimde 60 yaşındaydım’ (Medyascope)
Photo: VikiPicture / CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
