ISTANBUL: A Turkish court on Wednesday rejected a prosecutor’s attempts to shut down a leading anti-femicide campaign group on charges of violating administrative laws and “morality.”
The rare court victory for a Turkish rights group came as Ankara vows to mend ties with Western allies after May elections in which President Recep Tayyip Erdogan extended his dominant rule into a third decade.
“The court rejected the (petition) to shut down our platform,” the We Will Stop Femicide Platform representative Nursen Inal said.
“We are very happy, but (the trial) should not have happened in the first place.”
Riot police cordoned off Istanbul’s main courthouse and detained two supporters of the campaign group ahead of the closely watched verdict.
Prosecutors had asked the court to close the group for “acting against the law and morality” in hearings that had stretched out for more than a year.
The group, which says it was never presented with an explanation as to which laws it was supposed to have violated, had denounced the charges as politically motivated.
The We Will Stop Femicide Platform has been campaigning against the murder and abuse of women in the mostly Muslim but officially secular nation since 2010.
It became a lightning rod for criticism from Islamic conservatives after speaking out against Erdogan’s 2021 decision to pull Turkiye out of a European convention aimed at combating violence against women.
More conservative members of Erdogan’s ruling party also accused the group of damaging traditional family values by speaking out in defense of LGBTQ rights.
Erdogan himself branded the LGBTQ community “perverse” and repeatedly denounced their supporters during his May re-election campaign.
The We Will Stop Femicide Platform says 403 women were murdered in Turkiye last year and 423 in 2021.
The move to prosecute the group alarmed rights activists, who have long accused Erdogan of backsliding on democratic norms.
Turkiye this year reaffirmed its commitment to resume long-stalled negotiation to join the European Union.
But the bloc’s enlargement commissioner said on a visit to Ankara this month that Brussels needed to see tangible progress on Turkiye’s commitment to “democracy and the rule of law.”
Turkiye drops bid to close leading anti-femicide group
https://arab.news/gva6r
Turkiye drops bid to close leading anti-femicide group
- Rare court victory for a Turkish rights group came as Ankara vows to mend ties with Western allies
- The We Will Stop Femicide Platform has been campaigning against the murder and abuse of women
Hundreds mourn in Syria’s Homs after deadly mosque bombing
- Officials have said the preliminary investigations indicate explosive devices were planted inside the mosque but have not yet publicly identified a suspect
HOMS: Hundreds of mourners gathered Saturday despite rain and cold outside of a mosque in the Syrian city of Homs where a bombing the day before killed eight people and wounded 18.
The crowd gathered next to the Imam Ali ibn Abi Talib Mosque in the Wadi Al-Dhahab neighborhood, where the population is predominantly from the Alawite minority, before driving in convoys to bury the victims.
Officials have said the preliminary investigations indicate explosive devices were planted inside the mosque but have not yet publicly identified a suspect.
A little-known group calling itself Saraya Ansar Al-Sunna claimed responsibility for the attack in a statement posted on its Telegram channel, in which it indicated that the attack intended to target members of the Alawite sect, an offshoot of Shia Islam whom hard-line Islamists consider to be apostates.
The same group had previously claimed a suicide attack in June in which a gunman opened fire and then detonated an explosive vest inside a Greek Orthodox church in Dweil’a, on the outskirts of Damascus, killing 25 people as worshippers prayed on a Sunday.
A neighbor of the mosque, who asked to be identified only by the honorific Abu Ahmad (“father of Ahmad“) out of security concerns, said he was at home when he heard the sound of a “very very strong explosion.”
He and other neighbors went to the mosque and saw terrified people running out of it, he said. They entered and began trying to help the wounded, amid blood and scattered body parts on the floor.
While the neighborhood is primarily Alawite, he said the mosque had always been open to members of all sects to pray.
“It’s the house of God,” he said. “The mosque’s door is open to everyone. No one ever asked questions. Whoever wants to enter can enter.”
Mourners were unable to enter the mosque to pray Saturday because the crime scene remained cordoned off, so they prayed outside.
Some then marched through the streets chanting “Ya Ali,” in reference to the Prophet Muhammad’s cousin and son-in-law whom Shiite Muslims consider to be his rightful successor.
