PROCEDURE

The case originated in an application (no. 31080/02) against the Republic of Turkey lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by two Turkish nationals, Mr Hıdır Ateş and Ms Hünkar Demirel (“the applicants”), on 1 August 2002.

The applicants were represented by Mr Ö Kılıç, a lawyer practising in Istanbul. The Turkish Government (“the Government”) did not designate an Agent for the purposes of the proceedings before the Court.

On 29 June 2006 the Court decided to give notice of the application to the Government. Under the provisions of Article 29 § 3 of the Convention, it decided to examine the merits of the application at the same time as its admissibility.

THE FACTS

I. THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE CASE

The applicants were born in 1979 and 1951 respectively and live in Istanbul. The first applicant was the editor-in-chief of a weekly newspaper, Yedinci Gündem, and the second applicant was its owner.

In August 2001, in the tenth issue of the newspaper, an article which contained an interview with Cemil Bayık, who was one of the leaders of an illegal organisation, namely the PKK (the Kurdistan Workers' Party), was published. The relevant parts of the interview read as follows: “Three years have passed since the PKK declared a ceasefire to stop the bloodshed and to contribute to the peace process. Subsequently, the PKK withdrew its armed forces out of Turkey to maintain peace. However, the state did not take any steps for democratisation or to solve the Kurdish problem. ... The case brought against our leader Abdullah Öcalan is a case against the Kurdish people. Therefore, it is not our Prime Minister who wishes to be tried before the European Court of Human Rights, but it is our people. The law was violated in İmralı and, consequently, the death penalty imposed on Öcalan and on our people is not legitimate. All things considered, it is natural that our people have expectations from the European Court of Human Rights, the court of Europe which defends democracy, human rights and the rule of law. ...”

On 10 September 2001 the public prosecutor at the Istanbul State Security Court filed a bill of indictment against the applicants. By referring to the above-mentioned paragraphs of the interview, the public prosecutor accused the applicants of having allowed the publication of the declarations of an illegal armed terrorist organisation. The charges were brought under Article 6 §§ 2 and 4 of the Law on the Prevention of Terrorism (Law no. 3713), additional Article 2 of the Press Law (Law no. 5680) and Article 36 of the Criminal Code.

On 27 December 2001 the Istanbul State Security Court, composed of three civilian judges, convicted the applicants as charged and fined them 2,034,900,0000 Turkish liras (TRL) and TRL 4,069,800,0000 respectively. The first instance court further ordered temporary closure of the newspaper for a period of fifteen days.

The applicants appealed. On an unspecified date, the chief public prosecutor at the Court of Cassation submitted his written opinion on the merits of the applicants' appeal. The opinion was not notified to the applicants.

On 21 May 2002 the Court of Cassation upheld the judgment of 27 December 2001.

On 24 June 2002 the president of the Istanbul State Security Court sent the final judgment to the public prosecutor's office at the Istanbul State Security Court and requested that the order for the newspaper's closure be executed.

On 15 July 2002 two police officers executed the order of closure by way of notification of the order in question to the first applicant.