The trial of 23 people, including journalists and lawyers, has opened in Istanbul on Monday.

Jailed ETHA (Etkin News Agency) reporters Isminaz Temel and Havva Cuştan and lawyers Özlem Gümüştaş, Sezin Uçar, have appeared in Court on Monday together with Gülhan Kaya and Ali Haydar Doğan, who are free pending trial.

There are some of the 23 people under trial on charges of “membership to an organization" and "propaganda for an organization" at Istanbul 27th Heavy Penal Court of Justice.

The court was crowded as not only the imprisoned journalists, lawyers and others were present but also some of the defendants previously released pending trial.

Lawyers from the Libertarian Lawyers Platform (ÖHP), the Law Office of the Oppressed (EHB) and the Contemporary Lawyers Association (ÇHD), also attended the hearing together with HDK (Peoples’ Democratic Congress) deputy co-spokesperson Gulistan Kılıç Koçyiğit, and HDP (Peoples’ Democratic Party) deputies Züleyha Gülüm and Musa Piroğlu.

Military provocation

The gendarmeries tried to prevent families of the jailed defendants from greeting them but lawyers avoided the provocation.

Lawyers told the police that this could be seen as a threat.

Lawyer Bilgin Aydin stated that four lawyers were tried within the scope of the file and requested the lawyers to be included in the investigation.

ÖHP Istanbul spokesperson, lawyer İlknur Alcan said: "This investigation was against the law from the very beginning, and all of the searches, seizures and detentions were done illegally”.

Alcan added: “No data from these evidences is legal, they are polluted evidence” and demanded therefore that digital evidence be removed from the file.

The Court Panel decided to reject all the requests.