On the more than ten years of detention of İlhan İşbilen
When I examine the case of İlhan İşbilen, what lies before me is not merely a case of prolonged detention. It is the portrait of how a human life can be gradually crushed when the State loses the distance that must always exist between the exercise of public power and the rule of law. At the centre of that portrait is not a young, healthy individual with many years of life ahead of him. It is İlhan İşbilen—an eighty-year-old man who has reportedly suffered two strokes while in prison, who collapsed during a court hearing and had to be transferred to hospital, and for whom every new day now presents an additional risk to his health.
According to the official records of the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye, İlhan İşbilen was born on 1 April 1946 and served as a Member of Parliament for İzmir during the 24th legislative term. He has been deprived of his liberty since 14 December 2015. We are therefore speaking of a period exceeding ten years. Yet for an elderly person, ten years are not merely another segment on a calendar; they represent a substantial portion of the remainder of one’s life. When the State takes so many years from an individual’s life, it cannot justify that deprivation by invoking the “scope of the case file” or by repeatedly relying upon virtually identical detention decisions.
For years, government officials have comfortably repeated the same sentence: “Türkiye is a state governed by the rule of law.” It is easy to say. A state governed by the rule of law is not defined by elegant words written beneath decisions that happen to please those in power. The real test of the rule of law lies in how the State treats those whom the government regards as its opponents. When a person with whom you once sat in the same parliamentary group and shared the same political movement suddenly loses every legal safeguard after political paths diverge, what emerges is not the appearance of justice, but the shadow of political hostility. To consider someone acceptable while they stand beside you and to cast them outside the protection of the law once they stand against you is not an expression of state dignity; it is an abuse of power.
One point must be emphasized with particular clarity. I am not attempting in this opinion article to determine the merits of the criminal accusations against İlhan İşbilen. No one has the authority to do so outside a court of law. The determination of criminal responsibility belongs exclusively to an independent and impartial judiciary. It is precisely for that reason that keeping a person who has not been finally convicted imprisoned for more than ten years as though he were already serving a sentence is legally and morally unacceptable. Pre-trial detention is a preventive measure; it is not a punishment imposed in advance upon someone whom those in power dislike.
Even the judicial history of the case is far less straightforward than government supporters often suggest. Following the reversal decision delivered by the 3rd Criminal Chamber of the Court of Cassation in 2022, the local court insisted upon its previous judgment, and the case was therefore referred to the Criminal General Assembly of the Court of Cassation. On 9 April 2025, the Criminal General Assembly unanimously quashed the judgment once again. The reason was neither a minor procedural defect nor an insignificant clerical error. The judgment had been delivered without properly obtaining the public prosecutor’s final opinion on the merits, thereby restricting the defendants’ right of defence. When one of the country’s highest criminal judicial authorities itself concludes that the right of defence has been violated, it becomes impossible—both legally and morally—to continue treating İşbilen as though his guilt had already been conclusively established.
The contradiction is impossible to ignore. The conviction is quashed, the trial begins again, yet the detention continues. Years pass. Age advances. Health deteriorates. The State’s answer remains the same: the prison door stays closed. At that point, the measure has long ceased to be preventive. Once detention exceeds ten years, causes irreversible harm to health, and the authorities fail to explain concretely why less restrictive alternatives would be inadequate, what remains is no longer a precautionary measure but a form of de facto punishment that empties the presumption of innocence of any real meaning.
Of course, as it always does when confronted with criticism, the government will likely seek to distance itself from responsibility by repeating the familiar phrase: “The decisions are made by independent courts.” What a remarkably convenient sentence. Whenever judicial decisions support its position, the political leadership readily claims them as its own success; yet when accusations of injustice arise, it suddenly presents itself as the strongest defender of the separation of powers. The reality, however, is that the hostile political rhetoric employed for years by the executive, the political climate surrounding the judiciary, and the selective approach adopted toward seriously ill prisoners cannot be erased by a single sentence. Courts undoubtedly deliver judgments, but those who create the political environment that gradually undermines the rule of law cannot escape their own political responsibility.
İlhan İşbilen’s state of health has now become the most urgent aspect of this case. Publicly available reports indicate that he has suffered two strokes while in prison, that he now wears a cervical brace, and that he collapsed during a court hearing in July 2025, after which he was transferred to hospital. Because his complete medical records are not publicly available, it would be inappropriate to speculate about diagnoses that have not been officially disclosed. Yet even the facts that are publicly known are sufficiently grave. What more must happen before the request for his release is taken seriously? How much further must the condition of an eighty-year-old man deteriorate—one who has spent many years in prison, reportedly suffered two serious neurological episodes, and collapsed in the courtroom—before his continued detention is reconsidered? Must he leave prison in a coffin before his request for release is finally regarded as worthy of serious consideration?
That question is severe because the reality before us is equally severe. There is no benefit in softening reality through polite language when a person’s life is genuinely at risk. A prison gate must never be allowed to become the lid of a coffin. The rule of law does not consist of official statements issued after a person has died or of symbolic investigations commenced only after irreversible harm has occurred. Law fulfils its true function only when it is capable of recognizing danger in advance and acting to protect human life before it is too late. The duty of the State is not to test how much longer a prisoner can endure, but to preserve that prisoner’s life.
Article 17 of the Constitution guarantees the right to life and the right to physical integrity. Article 56 guarantees the right to health, while Article 61 expressly requires the State to protect elderly persons. Likewise, the guarantees contained in the European Convention on Human Rights concerning the right to life and the prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment do not cease to apply simply because a person is behind prison walls. The lesson that the European Court of Human Rights delivered to Türkiye in Gülay Çetin v. Türkiye—a lesson the authorities appear unwilling to learn—is unmistakably clear: indifference toward the suffering of a seriously ill detainee is not merely poor administration; it may amount to a violation of human rights capable of engaging the State’s responsibility for inhuman treatment.
Article 16 of Law No. 5275, governing the postponement of the execution of a sentence on medical grounds, applies directly to convicted prisoners. İlhan İşbilen, however, remains a pre-trial detainee following the quashing of the previous judgment and the reopening of the proceedings. This distinction should not weaken his legal protection; on the contrary, it should strengthen it. Where a person has not been finally convicted and his advanced age together with his serious health risks are undisputed, the authorities must explain in concrete terms why release under judicial supervision is not considered sufficient. Measures such as house arrest, a travel ban, financial security, or regular reporting obligations are all available under Turkish law. Persisting in the application of the most severe preventive measure to an eighty-year-old man under these circumstances creates the appearance not of legal necessity, but of an insistence upon punishment.
The State does not seek revenge. The State does not bear grudges. The State does not measure the pulse of a seriously ill prisoner as though political loyalty were a medical criterion. The moment it begins to do so, it loses the dignity that distinguishes a State governed by law and transforms public power into an instrument of personal or political retaliation. The fact that İlhan İşbilen once served as a Member of Parliament for the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) constitutes perhaps the greatest irony of this entire case. The condition of a person who once stood beneath the same political roof inevitably raises profound questions about both the government’s understanding of loyalty and its understanding of justice: Are all doors open while someone stands beside you, only for every legal safeguard to narrow once that person stands opposite you?
The government’s responsibility is not to respond to these questions with political rhetoric. Its positive obligation is to ensure that İlhan İşbilen’s complete medical records are examined without delay by an independent panel of medical experts, that the defence is granted full access to all medical reports, and that the necessity of his continued detention is subjected to a genuine and meaningful judicial review. The court, for its part, should not merely repeat formulaic justifications drafted many years ago. It must assess the present reality—his current age, his current medical condition, and the current procedural posture of the case—and reach a decision that satisfies the principle of proportionality. Under these circumstances, his immediate release under appropriate judicial supervision would not constitute an act of leniency; it would be a legal obligation imposed by the rule of law.
İlhan İşbilen may, of course, be tried before a competent court. He may not, however, be gradually separated from life under the guise of judicial proceedings. The allegations against him may certainly be examined, but judgments that were rendered after restrictions upon the right of defence and subsequently quashed cannot serve as a justification for detention without meaningful temporal limits. The State possesses the authority to punish those lawfully convicted. It does not possess the authority to bring a human being slowly closer to death. A legal order that confuses those two fundamentally different powers produces not justice, but fear and resentment.
One day, this case will inevitably come to an end. The case files will be closed. Judges will change. Governments will leave office. Yet the years taken from an eighty-year-old man will never be returned to him. If his deteriorating health ultimately leads to irreversible consequences, no official statement, no bureaucratic explanation, and no assertion that “all procedures were carried out in accordance with the law” will erase that responsibility. For sometimes a violation of the law arises not from an act that was committed, but from a duty that was knowingly left undone.
The true character of any government is revealed not by the opportunities it grants to its friends, but by the protection of law it affords to those whom it regards as its opponents. Today, the case of İlhan İşbilen stands before the Turkish government as precisely such a mirror. What that mirror reflects is neither the image of a strong State nor that of impartial justice. Instead, it reflects a conception of power that continues to display its strength against an eighty-year-old seriously ill man, regarding compassion as weakness and release as defeat. If the government is uncomfortable with this reflection, it should not blame the mirror. It should examine its own conduct.
İlhan İşbilen should be released immediately under appropriate judicial supervision. At this stage, every additional day that he spends in prison represents not only another day taken from his remaining life; it is also another fragment taken from Türkiye’s claim to be a state governed by the rule of law. Closing a prison door upon a human being is easy. The true dignity of a State lies in having the courage to open that door when both law and conscience declare that enough is enough.
REFERENCES
- Official records of the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye (TBMM) concerning İlhan İşbilen.
- Decision of the 3rd Criminal Chamber of the Court of Cassation (2022).
- Criminal General Assembly of the Court of Cassation, judgment of 9 April 2025.
- Constitution of the Republic of Türkiye, Articles 17, 56 and 61.
- European Convention on Human Rights, Articles 2 and 3.
- European Court of Human Rights, Gülay Çetin v. Türkiye.
- Law No. 5275 on the Execution of Sentences and Security Measures, Article 16.
