Turkey says half of appeals to ECHR over post-coup purge have been dismissed

Turkey's justice ministry said on Friday that the European Court of Human Rights had rejected half of the nearly 25,000 appeals submitted by Turkish citizens affected by the purge following last year's failed coup.

There was no immediate comment from the European court.

“While the number of applications waiting in front of the ECHR against our country was 24,600 on May 31, it decreased to 12,000 by June 30," said the ministry in a statement.

The ministry added it expected further rejections to follow on similar grounds.

More than 50,000 people have been detained and 150,000 have been suspended in a crackdown following the failed military coup against President Tayyip Erdogan. Turkey blames a US-based Muslim cleric and his network of followers for the failed coup.

In a statement, the ministry cited an ECHR ruling which rejected an appeal by a Turkish civil servant who was dismissed after the coup, saying he should have taken his case to a Turkish commission set up to adjudicate on appeals.

The ECHR had rejected 12,600 cases out of a total of 24,600 cases submitted to it.

Turkey established the commission with a decree on 23 January, in a move seen as a bid to ease criticism from European institutions over the post-coup crackdown and erosion of judicial independence.

According to the Hurriyet newspaper, most applications are expected to focus on dismissals from public service and educational institutions, as well as the closure of organisations.

Turkey issued arrest warrants for 72 university staff on Monday, including a former adviser to the main opposition leader who staged a mass rally on Sunday to protest deteriorating civil liberties in the country.

The warrants were issued as part of an investigation into the movement of the US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who is accused of orchestrating the attempted coup on 15 July, state-run Anadolu news agency reported.

Kemal Kilicdaroglu, leader of the secular-nationalist Republican People's Party (CHP), told a huge crowd on Sunday that Turkey was living under a dictatorship and pledged to keep challenging the government after completing a 25-day protest march from Ankara to Istanbul.

Police have so far arrested 42 of the staff from Istanbul's Bogazici and Medeniyet universities, Anadolu said.

It said eight of the 72 were from Bogazici, including well-known academic Koray Caliskan, who worked in the past as a voluntary adviser to Kilicdaroglu, according to a CHP official.