29/04/2025 | Writer: Kaos GL
We Are Still Witness Platform announced in a press statement that Interpol had rejected the request for a red notice against Selek. “We call on everyone who demands rights, law, and justice to stand behind Pınar Selek’s final acquittal as well,” they said. The next hearing is on October 21.
Photo by: MLSA
The fifth hearing in the retrial of sociologist and writer Pınar Selek, whose fourth acquittal in the case related to the Spice Bazaar explosion was overturned by the Court of Cassation, was held at Istanbul’s 15th High Criminal Court.
The hearing, which was scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m., started with a delay of about 45 minutes. Despite restrictions on the number of observers allowed in the courtroom, representatives from the French and Swiss consulates, French lawyers, academics, journalists, civil society organizations from both Turkey and abroad, We Are Still Witness Platform, activists, CHP Istanbul MP Türkan Elçi, Selek’s legal team, and numerous lawyers from the Istanbul Bar Association were present in the courtroom.
Selek’s lawyers requested that the outstanding issues in the case file be resolved, noting that several aspects remained incomplete.
According to a report by Rabia Çetin from MLSA, the hearing lasted about five minutes. The court ruled to uphold the previous arrest warrant against Selek, to wait for the outcome of the red notice process, and to reject the request to lift the arrest warrant for co-defendant Abdülmecit Öztürk. The next hearing is scheduled for Friday, October 21, at 10:45 a.m.
We Are Still Witness Platform: “We call on everyone who demands justice to stand behind Pınar Selek’s final acquittal as well”
We Are Still Witness Platform also released a press statement regarding the Pınar Selek case. In the statement, the platform said, “Interpol has rejected the request for a red notice against Pınar Selek,” and included the following remarks:
“The latest hearing in the 26-year-long fabricated Spice Bazaar case surrounding sociologist, writer, academic, and feminist activist Pınar Selek, after four previous acquittals, was held on Friday, April 25, at the Istanbul 15th High Criminal Court.
As may be recalled, at the previous hearing held on February 7 before the newly assigned panel of judges, the court had decided to uphold the arrest warrant against Selek, to wait for the outcome of the red notice request, and to write to the Ministry of Justice requesting information regarding letters rogatory (international legal assistance documents).
At the most recent hearing on April 25, it was revealed that an official letter stating Interpol had rejected the red notice request for Pınar Selek had been added to the case file. However, despite this official correspondence, the court repeated its previous interim decision and once again ruled to await the outcome of the red notice process. The court also decided to maintain the arrest warrant against Selek and to again write to the Ministry of Justice for information about the letters rogatory. The next hearing was postponed to October 21, 2025, at 10:45 a.m.
As always, we once again witnessed the strength that comes from solidarity and righteousness in a courtroom filled with a large international delegation of members of parliament, deputy mayors, lawyers, academics, and activists, as well as Deputy Consuls General from France and Switzerland, and Turkish MPs Türkan Elçi, Özgül Saki, and Filiz Kerestecioğlu, along with representatives of civil society organizations.
We call on everyone who demands rights, the rule of law, and justice to also stand behind Pınar Selek’s final acquittal.”
What happened?
Pınar Selek has been on trial for 25 years in connection with the July 1998 Spice Bazaar explosion in which seven people were killed. She has been acquitted four times in the case, which has been reopened repeatedly. Each acquittal was overturned by the Court of Cassation.
All expert reports prepared during the investigation concluded that the explosion was caused not by a bomb, but by a gas leak. Another defendant who had initially testified that they had planted a bomb in the bazaar with Selek later stated in court that the testimony had been obtained under torture and that they did not know Selek.
In the most recent ruling in 2014, the fifth time the case had been tried, Selek was acquitted once again. However, in 2022, the Court of Cassation's General Criminal Assembly overturned this decision, stating that Selek should be sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment. As a result, the case was reopened for a sixth time.
Tags: human rights, women, life
