EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
Wife of activist Osman Kavala pre-trial: 'I don't expect anything' from Turkish justiceIssued on: 22/04/2022 -
02:27 Osman Kavala's wife Ayse Bugra in Istanbul, Turkey, April 2022
Text by: Shona BHATTACHARYYA|
Video by: Shona BHATTACHARYYA
Days before Osman Kavala’s appearance in a Turkish court on Friday, his wife, Ayse Bugra, gave an exclusive interview to FRANCE 24. She spoke about the accusations faced by the so-called "red billionaire", a prominent member of Turkish civil society who has been behind bars without a sentence since October 2017. He risks life in prison if he is found guilty of "attempting to overthrow the government".
Osman Kavala, a philanthropist and entrepreneur nicknamed the "red billionaire" by the pro-government press for his left-wing activism, is set to appear in an Istanbul court on April 22. He is accused of "attempting to destabilise Turkey" during the failed coup of 2016. In the same file is a different charge related to another event: Kavala is also accused of organising and financing the Gezi protests of 2013. He has been in jail since October 2017 and risks spending the rest of his life there.
Ayse Bugra's voice has become a familiar one in international media, and if her speech seems hesitant at times, her English is impeccable and the words she chooses reveal the extent of the ordeal this academic has been undergoing for four and a half years now.
We began by asking why the Turkish justice system has been so relentless in its pursuit of her husband. "There are several theories, several hypotheses," she starts. "One of them, which actually is in harmony with the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights, is that it serves to intimidate civil society activists. So, it has an ulterior political purpose – civil society activists and human rights defenders in the country. As I said, this is in harmony with the ECHR ruling which said in [December 2019] that the detention of my husband constituted a violation of several articles of the European Convention of Human Rights."
Indeed, after several calls for Turkey, one of its founding members, to release Osman Kavala, in February 2022 the Council of Europe launched infringement proceedings against Ankara. Ayse Bugra goes on: "There are other theories about the influence of a certain group of politicians, people, who are in favour of severing, cutting the relationships between Turkey and Western democracies. So, the detention of my husband serves to detach Turkey from the Western democratic world." For Ayse Bugra this theory is absurd: her husband, she says, has never been affiliated with a political party or movement.
Kavala is an ideal target. Recep Tayyip Erdogan has elevated him to the level of public enemy number one of the Turkish nation and calls him the "agent of George Soros in Turkey". The 64-year-old embodies everything the Turkish President claims to oppose: "An internal enemy collaborating with external enemies", Ayse Bugra explains. "It is a particular political strategy which uses a polarising discourse and divides the population into "us" and "them"…I think my husband has been used in that particular strategy of polarisation."
'Absurd', incoherent charges
Accused of spying one day, attempting to overthrow the government the next, Osman Kavala was acquitted of certain charges then re-arrested for the same ones the same day. Different files, different accusations were combined. All seemed coordinated to prevent him from being able to leave the high security Silivri prison, in western Istanbul.
Born in Paris to a wealthy family, and raised in the United Kingdom, the philanthropist dedicated his fortune to the promotion of dialogue between Turkey’s different cultures and minorities, including the Kurds and the Armenians. He was awarded the European Archaeological Heritage Prize in 2019 and set up a number of initiatives including Anadolu Kültür, in Istanbul, where we met with his wife, located just a stone’s throw from the famous Gezi Park, whose planned destruction was the catalyst for a social protest movement in 2013. "Gezi is here, this is Gezi", Ayse Bugra says with a smile and a wave of her hand in the direction of the window that looks out onto a rare patch of greenery in central Istanbul. "Osman’s office is here, his mother lives here, this is a family building. Something extremely interesting was happening there, Gezi was an extremely interesting event. There were all kinds of people there – young, old, rich, poor. So of course, he would go there, and he would try to prevent the construction of a commercial building in that park."
No detail seems too small or insignificant to include it in the accusations against Osman Kavala. Among the elements put forth by the plaintiffs is a map with the distribution of bee colonies across Turkey, found in the art patron’s mobile phone. The document was presented as proof that Kavala was seeking to redesign the country's borders. To prove he had organised and financed the Gezi protests, the prosecution noted he had bought protesters some plastic tables and chairs, as well as poğaça, a kind of Turkish bread roll.
"The absurdity is in the charges themselves," explains the university professor. "These were nationwide protests, they were all through the country, and [they] involved, according to official figures, 3.5 million people. Imagine a single person organising and financing a national protest movement of that dimension. So, this in itself is absurd."
Culture as a weapon and a shield
When Ayse Bugra talks about the man she has called her husband for close to 35 years, her voice changes, and the faraway look in her eyes tells of the pain of their separation. "He has the right to make one 10-minute phone call every week, it was this morning. And that is basically to talk to his mother. She is quite old, it’s difficult for her. And then I see him every week, the visits were rare during the pandemic but now I go every week. We talk with a glass panel between us, by telephone, for an hour". The professor of political economy at the prestigious Bogazici University – also on the government's radar – displays the manners of an aristocrat and the speech patterns of a sage. "I don’t expect anything anymore. After having been subjected to a very long and very painful process which is very hard to explain in legal or even logical terms, I cannot predict anything. I don’t expect anything and I’m trying not to hope. Especially not hope. Because hope that ends with disappointment can be devastating." No matter what her husband does, Ayse Bugra tells us, it doesn’t seem to matter. "It’s really hard. During the last two hearings I refused to enter the courtroom, because it was too much. Lawyers present [a] very articulate, very substantive defence, and then, it is as if nothing was said. It’s always the same decision with the same wording that is repeated."
And yet, Ayse Bugra travels to the court every time, to show up for the friends, journalists and diplomats who are there to support her and her husband. "I feel that I have to be there, otherwise I wouldn’t go." How does she cope? Again, the same tight smile. "One manages. My husband and I are lucky because we really like literature, fiction."
A glimpse into Osman Kavala’s office shows books stacked on every surface, including one by Thomas Mann. In "The Magic Mountain", the German author writes, "A man lives not only his personal life, as an individual, but also, consciously or unconsciously, the life of his epoch and his contemporaries."
When Ayse Bugra talks about the man she has called her husband for close to 35 years, her voice changes, and the faraway look in her eyes tells of the pain of their separation. "He has the right to make one 10-minute phone call every week, it was this morning. And that is basically to talk to his mother. She is quite old, it’s difficult for her. And then I see him every week, the visits were rare during the pandemic but now I go every week. We talk with a glass panel between us, by telephone, for an hour". The professor of political economy at the prestigious Bogazici University – also on the government's radar – displays the manners of an aristocrat and the speech patterns of a sage. "I don’t expect anything anymore. After having been subjected to a very long and very painful process which is very hard to explain in legal or even logical terms, I cannot predict anything. I don’t expect anything and I’m trying not to hope. Especially not hope. Because hope that ends with disappointment can be devastating." No matter what her husband does, Ayse Bugra tells us, it doesn’t seem to matter. "It’s really hard. During the last two hearings I refused to enter the courtroom, because it was too much. Lawyers present [a] very articulate, very substantive defence, and then, it is as if nothing was said. It’s always the same decision with the same wording that is repeated."
And yet, Ayse Bugra travels to the court every time, to show up for the friends, journalists and diplomats who are there to support her and her husband. "I feel that I have to be there, otherwise I wouldn’t go." How does she cope? Again, the same tight smile. "One manages. My husband and I are lucky because we really like literature, fiction."
A glimpse into Osman Kavala’s office shows books stacked on every surface, including one by Thomas Mann. In "The Magic Mountain", the German author writes, "A man lives not only his personal life, as an individual, but also, consciously or unconsciously, the life of his epoch and his contemporaries."
Turkey's jailed rights defender makes final appeal before verdict
For his supporters, Osman Kavala has turned into a symbol of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's intolerance of dissent
One of Turkey's most famous prisoners made his final appeal for freedom on Friday, at the culmination of a years-long trial that has come to define Ankara's tense ties with Western allies in the wake of a failed 2016 coup.
Paris-born activist and philanthropist Osman Kavala was a relative unknown when he was detained on his arrival at Istanbul's airport from a trip to a cultural centre in the Turkish city of Gaziantep in October 2017.
But his continued imprisonment without a conviction has turned the 64-year-old into a hero for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's opponents -- and a focus of Western worries about the Turkish leader's comprehensive crackdown on dissent.
Prosecutors want Kavala found guilty of "attempting to overthrow" Erdogan's socially conservative government by financing a wave of 2013 protests and then being directly involved in the coup plot.
The verdict and sentence, expected to be issued by a panel of three judges on Monday, could see Kavala jailed for life without the possibility of parole if found guilty.
The marathon trial has been faithfully attended by Western diplomats, underscoring the continued importance of rights issues in their relations with Turkey, a strategic member of the NATO defence alliance.
"The fact that I have spent 4.5 years of my life in prison is a loss that cannot be compensated," Kavala told the court a closing statement issued by video link from his high-security prison outside Istanbul.
"The only thing that would console me is the possibility that what I have gone through helps to put an end to grave judicial mistakes."
- Personal enmity -
Kavala was acquitted of the first count linked to the 2013 protests in February 2020.
But he was detained before he had a chance to return home and then charged with the coup attempt the same night.
Kavala is now facing both charges in a trial that looks back on some of the most turbulent years of Erdogan's dominant 20-year rule.
The Turkish leader has made no secret of his personal enmity for Kavala.
Erdogan calls Kavala a communist agent of the Hungarian-born US philanthropist George Soros who is allegedly using foreign money to try and topple the state.
"We can never be together with people like Kavala," Erdogan declared in 2020.
But Kavala's treatment has prompted the Council of Europe to launch disciplinary proceedings against Turkey that could ultimately see Ankara's membership suspended in the continent's main human rights organisation.
- 'Emblematic case' -
Kavala is being tried with 16 other defendants implicated in the 2013 protests.
Nine of them currently live abroad while the remaining seven took turns on Friday to make their final statements in court.
Defendant Mucella Yapici -- also facing the threat of life in jail without the possibility of parole -- told the court the 2013 protests were the "most democratic, most creative and peaceful collective movement in this country's history".
Human rights advocates say Kavala's release would send a signal to Turkey's Western allies that its justice system is free from Erdogan's pressure.
"His unconditional release may mark a turning point in de-politicisation of judicial prosecutions in Turkey," Amnesty International's Turkey researcher Guney Yildiz told AFP.
"That's why the result of the emblematic case is quite serious."
Emma Sinclair-Webb of Human Rights Watch called the entire hearing a "show trial".
But Erdogan has seethed at the international publicity and condemnation generated by the case.
The tensions nearly caused an all-out diplomatic war when the United States and nine other Western embassies issued a joint letter of support for Kavala last October.
Media reports said Erdogan's advisers managed to convince him to walk back on his threat to expel the 10 countries' ambassadors after being briefed on the harm this might do to Turkey's investment climate.
fo/zak/pvh
For his supporters, Osman Kavala has turned into a symbol of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's intolerance of dissent
(AFP/OZAN KOSE)
Fulya OZERKAN
Fri, April 22, 2022,
Fulya OZERKAN
Fri, April 22, 2022,
One of Turkey's most famous prisoners made his final appeal for freedom on Friday, at the culmination of a years-long trial that has come to define Ankara's tense ties with Western allies in the wake of a failed 2016 coup.
Paris-born activist and philanthropist Osman Kavala was a relative unknown when he was detained on his arrival at Istanbul's airport from a trip to a cultural centre in the Turkish city of Gaziantep in October 2017.
But his continued imprisonment without a conviction has turned the 64-year-old into a hero for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's opponents -- and a focus of Western worries about the Turkish leader's comprehensive crackdown on dissent.
Prosecutors want Kavala found guilty of "attempting to overthrow" Erdogan's socially conservative government by financing a wave of 2013 protests and then being directly involved in the coup plot.
The verdict and sentence, expected to be issued by a panel of three judges on Monday, could see Kavala jailed for life without the possibility of parole if found guilty.
The marathon trial has been faithfully attended by Western diplomats, underscoring the continued importance of rights issues in their relations with Turkey, a strategic member of the NATO defence alliance.
"The fact that I have spent 4.5 years of my life in prison is a loss that cannot be compensated," Kavala told the court a closing statement issued by video link from his high-security prison outside Istanbul.
"The only thing that would console me is the possibility that what I have gone through helps to put an end to grave judicial mistakes."
- Personal enmity -
Kavala was acquitted of the first count linked to the 2013 protests in February 2020.
But he was detained before he had a chance to return home and then charged with the coup attempt the same night.
Kavala is now facing both charges in a trial that looks back on some of the most turbulent years of Erdogan's dominant 20-year rule.
The Turkish leader has made no secret of his personal enmity for Kavala.
Erdogan calls Kavala a communist agent of the Hungarian-born US philanthropist George Soros who is allegedly using foreign money to try and topple the state.
"We can never be together with people like Kavala," Erdogan declared in 2020.
But Kavala's treatment has prompted the Council of Europe to launch disciplinary proceedings against Turkey that could ultimately see Ankara's membership suspended in the continent's main human rights organisation.
- 'Emblematic case' -
Kavala is being tried with 16 other defendants implicated in the 2013 protests.
Nine of them currently live abroad while the remaining seven took turns on Friday to make their final statements in court.
Defendant Mucella Yapici -- also facing the threat of life in jail without the possibility of parole -- told the court the 2013 protests were the "most democratic, most creative and peaceful collective movement in this country's history".
Human rights advocates say Kavala's release would send a signal to Turkey's Western allies that its justice system is free from Erdogan's pressure.
"His unconditional release may mark a turning point in de-politicisation of judicial prosecutions in Turkey," Amnesty International's Turkey researcher Guney Yildiz told AFP.
"That's why the result of the emblematic case is quite serious."
Emma Sinclair-Webb of Human Rights Watch called the entire hearing a "show trial".
But Erdogan has seethed at the international publicity and condemnation generated by the case.
The tensions nearly caused an all-out diplomatic war when the United States and nine other Western embassies issued a joint letter of support for Kavala last October.
Media reports said Erdogan's advisers managed to convince him to walk back on his threat to expel the 10 countries' ambassadors after being briefed on the harm this might do to Turkey's investment climate.
fo/zak/pvh
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