For many years, the red lines drawn by the establishment prevented the true colors of Turkey from emerging. With a few masterful brushstrokes, the Turkish government has already succeeded in blending them into a more colorful and diverse picture.Trapped into a rigid mindset, many members of the judiciary still insist on painting by numbers instead of following the more creative approach adopted by the government. Articles 301 and 216 of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) and 25/6 of the Press Law, recently used to close down a publication entitled “Democratic Opening,” the law still contains plenty of articles that can be used and abused to preserve the status quo.
The latest example is the investigation launched under Article 216 against actress Hülya Avşar, who is accused of “inciting hatred and hostility in the public and humiliation of the public.” The popular actress reminisced about her upbringing as a child of mixed Kurdish/Turkish parentage and expressed her views about the government's democratic opening in an interview published in Milliyet and conducted by Devrim Sevimay, who is also under investigation.
Equally puzzling and out of sync with the more open atmosphere that is developing in Turkey is the continuing ban on YouTube, in place for nearly a year and a half. While the prime minister talks eloquently at the UN about the need to embrace diversity and to combat discrimination, zealous courts have recently blocked access to more Web sites, including the popular music exchanges MySpace and Last.FM.
Recently, the Supreme Court of Appeals also reinforced a culture of impunity when it acquitted a sergeant who had shot at a crowd of demonstrators, some of whom were throwing stones, killing one man, in Siirt in 2005. The court ruled that in view of the circumstances, the sergeant's reaction was understandable.
This flawed approach to justice and the numerous unnecessary court cases still launched to “protect the state” continue to tie the judicial system into knots and monopolize limited resources. Incidentally, it is also keeping the European Court of Human Rights very busy.
The Strasbourg court recently released statistics to mark its 50th anniversary. They show that in the past half-century, the court has issued 1,939 Turkey-related judgments and found violations of the European Convention on Human Rights in 1,676 of them.
While progress has been achieved in recent years and the worst abuses are undoubtedly in the past, it is worth nothing that of the 97,300 applications pending in front of the court as of Jan. 1 of this year, more than half were filed against Russia, Turkey and Romania. The 11,085 Turkey-related files currently pending account for 11.4 percent of the European court's current case load.
The government has declared 2010 the year of judicial reform and vowed to address some of Turkey's judicial shortcomings. This is an area where much work still needs to be done.
Changing the mentality will take time. The decision by the Ministry of Education to teach primary school children about tolerance and the fight against discrimination is undoubtedly a step in the right direction, which should ensure that the next generation grows up with a more open mind.
The canvas currently under development in Turkey could eventually show a more democratic country in all its diversity and colorful richness, provided the government succeeds in erasing the dark shadows still cast by a resistant judiciary.
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