UN holds symposium in Istanbul on fair trial

ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News

The United Nations held a regional symposium titled “Fair trials and due process in the counter-terrorism context” in Istanbul yesterday.

Senior United Nations officials, government representatives, and judicial and human rights experts from the Middle East and North Africa met in the Hilton Hotel to discuss how countries can ensure fair trials and due process for persons accused of acts of terrorism.

Istanbul’s chief prosecutor, Turan Çolakkadı, and the regional representative of the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights in the Middle East, Fateh Azzam, also attended the conference.
“In their fight against terrorism, some states have conducted activities which violate basic standards of fair trial, such as indefinite and incommunicado detention of terrorist suspects and the use of evidence obtained through torture. Others have imposed measures that limit access to the judicial process,” a senior U.N. official said, adding that all of these issues would be discussed during the two day symposium.