Header: Tony Fisher – Author
10 years on: Lawyers in Türkiye still targeted
By Tony Fisher
28 November 2025
ahir Elci, a prominent Kurdish human rights lawyer and then-president of the Diyarbakir Bar Association in south-east Türkiye, was killed at a press conference on 28 November 2015. His death could – and should – have been a turning point in securing respect for the rule of law and access to justice. Instead, we have seen even more lawyers being persecuted in Türkiye and on a worldwide basis for defending human rights.
A decade after his death, no one has been held accountable. Justice – the very concept Tahir so passionately defended – has been denied to him, his family, friends and colleagues. I am one of those friends.
On that fateful day, Tahir was speaking at a peace rally in Diyarbakir when police officers opened fire on two fleeing militia members of the Kurdish militant group PKK as they ran through the crowd, and he was fatally shot. The subsequent investigation and criminal prosecution were marred by severe delays and a lack of transparency and impartiality. There were serious flaws in the court proceedings, including key evidence and witnesses being lost or overlooked. In June 2024, the three police officers charged with his unlawful killing were acquitted.
Tahir spent his life defending human rights and equal access to justice for all, despite facing severe reprisals for his actions. In November 1993, Turkish authorities raided his office, seizing case files and evidence. Tahir was arrested and subjected to physical and psychological torture, including a mock execution. He was charged with possessing illegal written materials, but the case was suspended in February 1994.
Ten years after Tahir’s death, lawyers in Türkiye are still being targeted for doing their job and standing up for people, their communities and justice almost daily. Tahir’s death shocked many in the legal community across the globe. He was not only a lawyer, he was a symbol of courage and integrity.
I had the pleasure of working with Tahir throughout my career. In the 1990s on a village destruction case Tahir had been working on when he was arrested, and on a Grand Chamber case challenging the 10% election threshold in Türkiye in 2007. He also regularly attended hearings in the cases of lawyers who had been prosecuted for doing their jobs in Türkiye, many of which I observed on behalf of the Law Society.
