The former head of a Turkish journalistic group, Mr Hidaget Karajawho is currently serving a sentence for “terrorism”, had Ankara condemned by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) for the “excessive” duration of his temporary detention, which reached almost three years.

In its decision, the ECtHR mainly points to “the stereotypical enumeration (…) of motives of a general nature” by the Turkish criminal courts that tried the plaintiff, “without an in-depth analysis of the arguments in favor of his release”.

The temporary detention of Karatza, who was born in 1963, began on December 18 2014 and it did not end until November 3rd 2017the date of his first-trial conviction to prison terms for “terrorism”, that is, it lasted two years and 11 months, the European court points out in its decision.

At the time of his arrest, the court recalls, he ran the Samaniolu media group, which is affiliated with Fethullah Gülen’s organization, which is considered a terrorist organization by Ankara.

Once his valuable ally Erdoganpreacher Fethullah Gulen was accused by Turkish authorities of spreading corruption allegations targeting the government in December 2013, when President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was still prime minister.

The Turkish authorities accused Karaca of ensuring that one of the Samaniolus group’s channels aired a television series which slandered, “portraying them as terrorists, the members of another Islamist organization, known as ‘tahsigeciler’ (‘the commentators’ ‘)”, with views “generally opposite to those of the Fetullahists”, reports the ECtHR.

Invoking articles of the European Convention on Human Rights, Karadzha complained that he had not been able to “effectively challenge the regularity of his temporary detention”, as well as its duration.

The European judges vindicated him on several points, mainly regarding the “irregularity of the decisions” to remain in pre-trial detention and the apparently “excessive” duration of this measure.

Ankara will have to pay him 18,000 euros, mainly for moral damage.