02 Mart 2021
This event is a democracy watch to show solidarity with one of the most prominent human rights activists and parliamentarians in Turkey who is threatened by imprisonment this week.
Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu will host a democracy watch as an online Zoom meeting for two consecutive days on Tuesday and Wednesday this week. He is seeking support from parliamentarians from all over the world who care about human rights and democracy. There will be a live and recorded broadcast of the meeting from his Youtube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3Yz0rXpW4g8SKkofm0423A). Simultaneous translation will be present during the Zoom meeting (Turkish-> English, English->Turkish).
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Ömer Faruk Gergerlioglu is a prominent human rights evangelist and activist and has been the President of MAZLUMDER (A Human Rights Organisation in Turkey) between 2007 – 2009. He was elected as an MP from Kocaeli province under the Peoples’ Democracy Party (HDP) in 2018 (1).
Turkey is undergoing a vicious transformation in which democracy, rule of law, basic freedoms, constitutional rights, and human rights are rapidly diminishing (2). The election of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as President in 2014 and his gaining of excessive powers in the 2018 constitutional referendum have created an oppressive populist regime in Turkey. The check and balances system, the judiciary, the government, the state, and most of the Parliament fell under one man’s rule.
Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu was only one of the few MPs, who indefatigably pursued and expressed excessive human rights violations that became systematic, widespread, excessive, and with impunity in a rapidly declining democracy.
He was sentenced to 2 years and 6 months of imprisonment due to retweeting an online newspaper article about the possibility of peace between the government and the PKK. The judicial authorities progressed the case despite his election as an MP, which should have stopped the case due to legislative immunity. His conviction was ratified by the Supreme Court last week. The Parliament is expected to accept the notification this week, which will cause his position and legal immunity to be lifted.
If this happens, human rights activism and the Parliamentary stand against human rights violations in Turkey will suffer thoroughly and Turkey’s rapid decline as a democratic Western society, once accepted as an example, will be heavily affected.
Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu is the lifeline, the only voice for millions of Turkish citizens who are heavily oppressed and stripped from their basic, constitutional rights.
Thus, we kindly ask for all members of parliaments all around the world to give a hand to Mr. Gergerlioğlu and Turkish democracy (3)
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(1) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ömer_Faruk_Gergerlioğlu
(2) Turkey fell from 80th position to 107th in Rule of Law Index (WSJ), 149th to 154th in World Press Freedom Index (RSF), 97th to 104th in World Democracy Inde0 (EIU)
(3) https://www.mei.edu/publications/erdogans-war-peace-gergerlioglu-case
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