CAT/C/66/D/827/2017 3.5 The Hizmet movement and its members have been demonized in the media and in the speeches of Turkish officials. On 7 June 2017, at a Ramadan ceremony (iftar), President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan invited the Turkish people to “teach a lesson” to persons who had been released in the investigations into the Hizmet movement, specifying that they should not escape punishment so easily, even if they were not criminals. The complainant explains that his membership in the Hizmet movement is known to all in his city in Turkey and that there is therefore a real risk that he will be subjected to ill-treatment by the population, with no effective protection from the Government.9 Furthermore, the complainant’s posts on Twitter prove that he promoted the ideals of the Hizmet movement’s spiritual founder, Fethullah Gülen. 3.6 The complainant is wanted by the Turkish authorities in the context of investigations into the Hizmet movement in the city of Uşak. His relatives – his sister-in-law, his brotherin-law, and his wife’s uncle and his sons – are all in detention because of their membership in the Hizmet movement. A decision of the Minister of the Interior of Turkey, published in the Official Gazette of 10 September 2017 and containing 99 names, including the complainant’s, specifies that the Turkish Government intended to revoke the Turkish nationality of those persons if they did not return to Turkey within three months of the decision’s publication.10 The complainant therefore faces a foreseeable, personal, present and real risk of torture if extradited to Turkey. State party’s observations on the admissibility 4.1 On 19 August 2017, the State party challenged the admissibility of the communication. It specifies that the Moroccan authorities received from the Turkish authorities – formally and through diplomatic channels – the request for the extradition of the complainant to Turkey on the basis of the provisions of the Agreement between the Kingdom of Morocco and the Republic of Turkey on Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters and Extradition concluded on 15 May 1989. On 31 May 2017, the Court of Cassation issued a decision in favour of the extradition request, ruling that the request by the Turkish authorities was not only supported by an international arrest warrant, but also met the conditions of form and substance required by the Moroccan Code of Criminal Procedure and by the Agreement on Mutual Assistance. In court, the complainant fully benefited from his rights as guaranteed by the universally recognized principles and rules of the right to a fair trial. 4.2 Even if the decision of the Court of Cassation was not subject to any ordinary appeal, it could nevertheless be subject to an application for revocation, in accordance with articles 563 and 564 of the Code of Criminal Procedure.11 The complainant has thus not exhausted all domestic remedies. 4.3 Secondly, with respect to the allegation that the extradition request is of a political nature, the Court of Cassation concluded that the acts for which the complainant has been charged in Turkey are criminal acts under Moroccan criminal law, as they are related to the establishment and direction of a terrorist organization and to money-laundering. Such acts can neither be considered to be political in nature or associated with a political offence nor be treated as a failure to carry out military obligations, just as they cannot be associated 9 10 11 4 The complainant points out that one person was tortured by a mob waiting for him at the door of the plane when extradited to Turkey from northern Cyprus, in plain view of police officers, but had been fortunate enough to escape without being lynched on the airport tarmac, which is supposed to be a high security zone. http://m2.shaber3.com/flas-yeni-vatandaslikan-cikarma-listesi-yayinlandi-haberi/1290163 (in Turkish only). Under article 563 the judgments of the Court of Cassation can be subject to an application for revocation in the following cases: (a) if a decision has been handed down on the basis of documents declared or recognized to be forgeries; (b) if it is necessary to correct judgments vitiated by an obvious material error and that can be remedied using material provided by the decision itself; (c) if the Court has failed to rule on a request presented in the context of the presentation of evidence or if the reasoning of the decision has not been specified; (d) and if a decision of inadmissibility or termination of a case has been issued for reasons arising from elements considered to be authentic, but which prove to be false following the submission of new documents that are equally authentic. GE.19-10059