22/02/2018 | Writer: Yıldız Tar
The Administrative Court rejected Kaos GL and Pink Life’s appeal to halt the execution of the indefinite ban on LGBTI events.
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The Administrative Court rejected Kaos GL and Pink Life's appeal to halt the execution of the indefinite ban on LGBTI events. Lawyer Kerem Dikmen: "Impacts of these obviously unlawful actions are ignored. How will we compensate the events we could not organize?”
Two LGBTI organizations in Ankara, Kaos GL and Pink Life’s separate court appeals to halt the execution of Ankara Governorship’s indefinite ban on LGBTI events were rejected by the Administration Court.
Ankara 4th Administration Court rejected Kaos GL’s appeal to halt the execution, and they indicated in the grounds of the rejection that “the ban decision will not cause unrecoverable or impossible results, and the decision is not unlawful”. Similarly, Ankara 13th Administration Court rejected Pink Life’s appeal with the same grounds.
Governorship’s plead: “The ban is legal”
Ankara Governorhip reminded the 15th article of the Constitution on “stopping the use of fundamental rights and freedoms” in their plead given subsequent to Administration Court’s request. By addressing the state of emergency situation, Governorship defended their decision that the ban does not violate international contracts and there was no violation of "core rights”. “The decision is legal” they stated.
On the other hand, the associations demanded that the ban announced on the grounds of “social sensitivites and sensibilities”, “protection of public health and values” and “protection of the rights and freedoms of others” must be reversed, and due to the fact that the ban would cause irrecoverable results execution of the decision must be stopped immediately.
“Impacts of this unlawful action are ignored”
Kerem Dikmen, one of the lawyers applied to the court on behalf of Kaos GL, analyzed the decision of the court. Reminding that even if Kaos GL applied to the court right after the ban decision, the court gave the final decision on 25th of January, Dikmen said:
“The ban decision was given on 18th and announced on 19th of January. Kaos GL took action on 20th of January to get a quicker result. We were wishing that the first investigation would be made as soon as possible, the lawsuit petition would be issued to the Governorship quickly, and accordingly duration for their response would be shorter. Additionally, we knew it is stated in the legislation that in the stop the execution cases 30-day response duration of the court shall be shortened.”
Underlying that even if the decision did not directly ban the activities of the associations, it turned into “the ban of the activities”, Lawyer Dikmen said “With the rejection of our appeal to stop the execution, the impacts of this unlawful action are ignored.”
“What will the compensation of the events that could not be held be?”
Lastly, Dikmen analysed the expression that “the ban decision will not cause unrecoverable or impossible results”:
“Decision of halting the execution must be given in the case that both the ban is obviously illegal and it would cause unrecoverable results. It is not a judicial discretion, but a legal obligation. While rejecting the appeal, the court implies two things: The governorship has authority to ban the events forever, and the compensation of the results is possible for future. However, how it would be possible to compensate the events that could not be held? For example, our event planned to be held on 8th of March International Women’s Day in 2018 would not be taken place, so what will be the alternative of this?
“Right to move and right to communicate for a person is the same for an association’s right to organize and event. In this respect, the current situation is that the LGBTI associations in Ankara are detained, and even arrested. Therefore, this ban implies the same results for us.”
Translation: Damla Umut Uzun
Related content:
Indefinite “public morality” ban on LGBTI events by Governorship of Ankara
Kaos GL and Pink Life: Ankara Governor’s ban on LGBTI events illegal!
Kaos GL and Pink Life take the Governorship ban to court
Chronology of LGBTI+ bans in Turkey
Tags: human rights
