Minister Ergin to meet HRW group

ANKARA - Hürriyet Daily News

Minister Sadullah Ergin is expected to share the government’s ongoing human rights efforts with the Human Rights Watch [HRW] delegation, an official says. AA photo

Just days after releasing a report in which it urged the Turkish government to take action on the abuses committed by public officials in 1990s in the southeastern Anatolia region, a delegation from a leading New York-based human rights organization will today be in Ankara to meet Turkey’s justice minister.

“The minister [Sadullah Ergin] will share the government’s ongoing efforts on this issue with the Human Rights Watch [HRW] delegation. Turkey is maintaining its action for democratization without stepping back,” a high-ranking official from the Justice Ministry told the Hürriyet Daily News yesterday. “The [prospective] fourth judiciary package is being designed to remedy the condemnations of the European Court of Human Rights [ECHR],” the official, speaking on condition of anonymity, added.

While speaking about the previously announced fourth judicial package on Aug. 28, Justice Minister Ergin had said: “The fourth judicial package aims to remove the results of the over 2,000 ECHR rulings that have been made against Turkey since 1959. The package will also help prevent future breaches [of the convention].”

HRW released a report on Sept. 3 entitled “Time for Justice: Ending Impunity for Killings and Disappearances in 1990s Turkey,” in which the ongoing trial of retired Colonel Cemal Temizöz and six others for the murder and disappearance of 20 men and boys between 1993 and 1995, was closely examined.

In its report, HRW calls on the government to commit its efforts to preventing statutory time limits - which is 20 years for crimes committed before 2005 - witness intimidation, and other obstacles to the prosecution of public officials for killings, disappearances, and torture. The report also said that the Turkish Parliament should establish an independent parliamentary truth commission to investigate disappearances, killings, and other serious human rights violations by suspected state perpetrators.