Turkey’s top court follows ECtHR ruling, finds uploading correspondence to judicial network server violates inmate’s rights

A week after a decision issued by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), Turkey’s top court has ruled that uploading correspondence onto the National Judicial Network Server (Ulusal Yargı Ağı Bilişim Sistemi, or UYAP) violated the right to respect for privacy and freedom of communication, the Stockholm Center for Freedom reported.

According to a report by the Bianet news website, the Constitutional Court heard an individual application filed by Ümit Karaduman claiming that his rights, enshrined in Articles 20 and 22 of the Constitution, had been violated.

The decision was published in the Official Gazette on Thursday.

The ECtHR ruled on March 29 that Turkey violated the right to respect for private life of 14 inmates by uploading their incoming and outgoing correspondence onto UYAP.

A central information system, UYAP covers all judicial institutions and other government departments that have been equipped with computers and given access to all legislation, jurisprudence and judicial records.

“The Court found that the uploading of the correspondence of remand and convicted prisoners onto the UYAP server stemmed directly and specifically from an instruction issued by the Ministry of Justice on 10 October 2016 and reissued on 1 March 2017,” the Strasbourg judges said in the decision.

Applicants Nuh Uzun and 13 other Turkish nationals were detained and incarcerated in various prisons following a coup attempt in July 2016. Some of them were subsequently released while others are still in jail.