On Wednesday 26 March 2014, Dr. Yaman Akdeniz, Professor of Law at the Faculty of Law, Istanbul Bilgi University and Dr. Kerem Altıparmak, Assistant Professor at the Faculty of Political Sciences, Ankara University, Turkey applied to the European Court of Human Rights with regards to the blocking of Twitter from Turkey.

Akdeniz & Altiparmak requested the European Court of Human Rights to issue an Interim Measure subject to Rule 39 of the Rules of Court to ask the Turkish authorities to lift the access blocking decision as there is an imminent risk of irreparable damage to the right to free elections which is a fundamental principle of any effective democracy and freedom of expression.

In their submission they wrote that

“Today, Twitter plays a far more critical role than the role the Cumhuriyet Newspaper had during the 2007 elections. Blocking and censorship of the Twitter platform and website is a significant democratic deficit in Turkey. There are only 5 days left until the local elections. It is of dire importance that the European Court of Human Rights issue an injunction within 24 hours. If the decision is postponed to a date after the elections, irreparable damage will result and any information shared after that date will not have the same value and impact.”

Their full submission to the European Court of Human Rights may be accessed as a PDF file here.