Businessperson Osman Kavala, who received an aggravated life sentence in the Gezi trial and has been imprisoned for 1766 days, recalled Henri Barkey’s statement about the dinner, which was cited as the reason for being accused of “espionage”, and said, “Henri Barkey was not with me at Karaköy restaurant on July 18, 2016, Aslı “His statement that he had dinner with Aydıntaşbaş made the deliberate distortions in the indictment about me public. We complained to the HSK for the second time about the indictment. Our first complaint was about the use of false statements in the indictment.”
“IT IS DANGER TO ALL CITIZENS”
In his written statement, Kavala said, “This indictment, which was prepared with the aim of continuing my detention at all costs after my acquittal from the Gezi trial, contains a series of factual falsifications. Another issue as important as these is the falsification of laws, which poses a danger to all citizens. The claim In order to make my activities, which are all legal, a criminal act, the office of espionage designed a crime against the definitions of the law. At my trial, I pointed out that this behavior paralleled the practices of the Nazi era. I didn’t care that Aslı Aydıntaşbaş didn’t talk about the food in the restaurant before and that she didn’t make a statement about it either.”
“SUCH CLAIMS ARE THE PRIORITY PROBLEM OF OUR COUNTRY’S JUDICIARY”
Kavala said:
“The fact that the espionage charge became unnecessary and resulted in acquittal after the 13th High Criminal Court gave the politically desired sentences in the Gezi trial, revealed that this accusation consisted of a fiction. With this decision of the ECHR, the invalidity of the government’s defense stating that “we have implemented the ECtHR decision” was revealed, and that what was done was to circumvent the law. We hope that the complaints we have made to the HSK will serve this purpose.”