The Grand Chamber said it was not possible to conclude that Turkey acted in "good faith" or in a manner compatible with the "spirit" of the Kavala judgment

The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) declared on 11 July that Turkey has failed to fulfill its obligations under Article 46 of the European Convention on Human Rights by refusing to release imprisoned business person and civil society figure Osman Kavala despite a Court judgment delivered in 2019.

Kavala, imprisoned since November 2017, was first arrested and put in pre-trial detention on "coup" charges in connection with the Gezi Park protests of 2013. He was acquitted and released at the end of the trial but was immediately re-arrested, this time under "espionage" charges. The government has long argued before the ECtHR that Kavala was acquitted and released in the case that was considered by the Strasbourg court but Kavala continued to face "coup" charges in connection with the Gezi protests after a regional court of appeals overturned the verdicts of acquittal in the original trial and ordered a re-trial. That re-trial was later merged with the "espionage" and "coup" trial in connection with the July 15, 2016 coup attempt, as a result of which Kavala was held in pre-trial detention. However, in April 2022, an Istanbul court convicted Kavala and his seven co-defendants of "coup" charges in connection with the Gezi Park protests, while acquitting him of "espionage" charges. 

Full text of the judgment can be viewed here.

The Grand Chamber judgment is part of infringement proceedings launched against Turkey by the Council of Europe's Committee of Ministers, in charge of supervising the execution of the ECtHR judgments. In February 2022, the Court was asked by the Committee to ascertain whether Turkey was in breach of its obligations under the Convention as a result of its refusal to release Kavala.

In its Grand Chamber judgment, the ECtHR said that the espionage suspicions that led to second imprisonment of Kavala were "based on facts that were similar, or even identical, to those the Court had already examined" in its 2019 judgment.

The decision was made by a sixteen votes to one. Saadet Yüksel, the Turkish judge of the ECtHR, cast the only dissenting vote.

The Court said the measures and action plans offered by Turkey towards the execution of the 2019 judgment "did not permit it to conclude that the State Party had acted in 'good faith,' in a manner compatible with the 'conclusions and spirit' of the Kavala judgment."

Turkey, on the other hand, swiftly responded to the Grand Chamber judgment. In a statement, the Foreign Ministry said the government regularly provided information on the developments in the judicial proceedings in Kavala's case. "However, the ECtHR has unfortunately failed to meet our expectations by the decision announced today (11 July 2022) and once again called into question the credibility of the European human rights system," it said.

"We expect from the CoE Committee of Ministers, which will follow the process during the next stage, that it sets aside its previous biased and selective approach, acts in common sense and in avoiding certain circles’ efforts to politicize the matter," the statement further said.

The case is now set to be sent back to the Committee of Ministers, which will decide on appropriate sanctions.