Gov’t mulls to ban lawyers linked to terrorists 

ANKARA

The government will take necessary actions to ban the lawyers with links to the terrorist organizations, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said, slamming a group of lawyers that hung the poster of a female lawyer, who died after a seven-month-long hunger strike in protest of her detention on charges of terrorism.

“We are going to do the necessary in order to cut this bloody path [that turns a] lawyer into the terrorist in the coming period,” Erdoğan said in an address on the occasion of the start of the judicial year on Sept. 1.

Lawyer Ebru Timtik, who was sentenced to 13 years in prison due to the membership of a terror organization, died on Aug. 27 after a long hunger strike. A big poster of her was hung at the premises of the Istanbul Bar Associations by anonymous persons, causing the government’s reaction.

Recalling that some lawyers attended the funeral of Timtik with their robes and issued statements after her, Erdoğan said, “Attorneyship is not to defend the cruel. It’s to defend justice. All that these things show is that this is not a relationship between the lawyer and client.”

If those who are working in different institutions can be expelled from their jobs due to their ties with the terrorists, a discussion should be launched whether the same can be applied to the lawyers, the president said.  

Having ties with terrorists is forbidden for every public servant and it’s relevant for the lawyers as well, Erdoğan said, “There should be a price for them if they do it.”