Monitoring Desk
STRASBOURG: The European Court of Human Rights, also called , on Tuesday condemned Turkiye for failing to protect the private life of an eminent Turkish actress who had been secretly filmed kissing another celebrity at her home, and the footage was broadcasted on a television channel.
Birsen Berrak Tuzunatac, a cinema, and Turkish soap opera celebrity and actress won the marathon case at the Strasbourg-based ECHR, which issued a ruling while saying that Turkiye had violated the European Convention of Human Rights by rejecting her domestic but legal complaints.
The actress, now 38, had filed a suit in 2010 in Turkiye against the company of a Turkish television channel that filmed her “kissing” another Turkish star “on the terrace” at her home.
Tuzunatac said she had been filmed without her knowledge, which was a breach of her right to privacy, but in 2013, the Istanbul regional court dismissed her claim on the grounds she had been filmed from the nearby street, and there had been no intrusion inside her home.
Its ruling was then upheld by both Turkiye’s Court of Cassation and its Constitutional Court.
The European Court of Human Rights named the male actor involved as a prominent figure with the initials SG But Turkish media had widely reported that he is Sahan Gokbakar, one of Turkiye’s most famous screen faces star of blockbuster comic movies.
ECHR said in its ruling that despite their huge fame, “someone’s love life is in the principle of a strictly private nature” meanwhile, the video in question “looks to have had the only purpose of satisfying the curiosity of a specific audience.”
It further said that as the reporting of the incident failed to adhere to the “standards of responsible and professional journalism,” the domestic courts in Turkiye “should have shown greater rigor when weighing the various aspects being involved.”
European Court ruled against Turkish Court
ECHR ruled that Turkiye had violated Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which guarantees respect for a person’s private life.
Turkish TV celebrities like Tuzunatac, while little famous in the West, face immense scrutiny at home in the soap-mad country, where newspapers and websites in Turkiye are filled with pictures of national-level celebrities at work and play.
The European Court, part of the pan-European rights body the Council of Europe, has continuously ruled against Turkiye in recent past over cases of detained opposition figures such as Kurdish leader Selahattin Demirtas and the civil society activist Osman Kavala.
