Etudes par pays volume 2, PDF, 346 p., 1,4 Mo - Femise

11873_2002 Study D2: Poverty, Informal Sector, Health and Labour
regulate the area of crime and punishment should equally protect the
essential rights and freedom of both the victim and the guilty in the sense of
justice. But up to recent years, it is difficult to say that primarily the Turkish
Punishment Law and other acts that regulate the crime and punishment area
have been applied in the way mentioned above.
For example; in punishment acts, the area of crimes that are committed
against the State has been thoıght very wide and to express the ideas that are
against the official ideology were accepted as crime. So the freedom of
expressing your opinion- one of the basic human rights- was dramatically
restricted. From this perspective, up to the end of 1990s , Turkey reflected
itself as an authoritarian state rather than a state that is respectful to human
rights.
In December 1999, Turkey, which had been trying to be a member of the
European Union (EU) since 1960s, got the status of being a candidate
country to it. Apart from political, economic, and social rules, naturally
there are legal rules to be a member of the EU. These rules are called
Copenhagen Criteria and to carry them out is the pre-condition of the
membership. For this reason, since the beginning of 2002 to make its law
regulations concordant with the EU regulations, Turkey have prepared
seven adaptation packets including changes in some acts.
Again for the same reason,there have been significant changes in crime acts.
For example; Death Penalty has been abolished, and the area of political
crimes – icluding the crime of expressing opinion- has been restricted. In
short, The Turkish Grand National Assembly has enthusiastically been
working to make Turkish Law Regulations concordant with the EU. Also
the governments in recent years have been very careful and extremely
sensitive about the matter and are trying to make it the general policy of the
country.
Apart from the process of integration with the EU, the studies that have
been carried out since the mid 1980s to update the Turkish Crime Law – the
basic source of crime law in Turkey - are due to be completed.
In Turkey the basic rules that regulate the crime and punishment area are in
the Constitution and in the Turkish Crime Law. In the Constitution the
principles at the highest level about this subject are arranged in the 37th and
38th articles:
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