CYIL vol. 14 (2023)

CYIL 14 (2023) EARTHQUAKES IN TÜRKIYE AS A VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS… positive obligations under the European Convention and European Court rulings in which building standards were discussed. In other words, despite amendments to Turkish legislation and the normative standards, their realization in practice is lacking. Thus, the earthquakes in 1999, as discussed in the case Özel and Others v. Turkey , 65 have not provided a lesson to state authorities, despite the existence of aftermath research and analysis by experts. The building standards, in which the normative basis and regulations were disregarded, remain in the same position of negligence and inadequate control by the state. As for the preparedness of the state for earthquake consequences according to humanitarian standards for the protection of affected people, the current situation has revealed the Turkish failure to implement the recommendations of UN agencies, including the United Nations Development Programme, in 2011 on integrated local rural development. 66 Thus, failure to develop rural and remote areas for seismic activity led to limited possibilities for relocating people affected by earthquakes to safer areas, and thus they were denied access to vital provisions important for the protection of health and life. Foreseeability of natural disasters – in this case, an earthquake – shall enable the state to provide for the resilience of cities to minimize or at least reduce the risks to the population; however, as has been seen through the years, even with the help of ECtHR decisions and rulings, the aforementioned is not thoroughly addressed by the state due to weak or weathered disaster risk governance. Although the state adopted several directives and laws tackling diverse strategies to build and become more resilient to the shocks and stresses of predictable seismic activity, the results have not been optimistic, which was proved by the consequences of the February 2023 earthquakes. The role and impact of the European Court towards the CoE member states should not be underestimated though, following the aforementioned level of execution of its judgments in Türkiye (89%), and also its continuing activity in the region. Even before any applications against Türkiye from those affected in the 2023 earthquake materialized, the European Court had already taken measures 67 to deal with potential cases sent from the earthquake zone in Türkiye. These measures included the assessment of compliance: (i) with the requirements of Rule 47 of the Rules of Court; (ii) with the admissibility criterion on time limit within the exceptional circumstances under Articles 35 and 43 § 1 of the Convention; and (iii) the possibility of providing exceptions to the measures where appropriate and on a case-by-case basis. Although officially, the normative basis of Türkiye was positively impacted by the European Court, it is necessary to consider the implementation of such norms in practice since the positive obligations of the states within the European Convention consist of not 65 Judgment of the ECtHR in Özel and Others v. Turkey , 2015, Applications Nos. 14350/05, 15245/05 and 16051/05. 66 Turkey: Integrated Local Rural Development , United Nations Development Programme United Nations Capital Development Fund, Poverty Reduction and Achievement, UNDP, 2011. https://www.undp.org/sites/g/files/ zskgke326/files/publications/Turkey(2011nov)_Web.pdf. 67 European Court takes measures to deal with cases sent from earthquake zone in Türkiye , ECtHR Press release; Registrar of the Court ECHR 078 (2023) 09.03.2023, https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/app/conversion/ pdf/?library=ECHR&id=003-7589482-10437077&filename=European%20Court%20takes%20measures%20 to%20deal%20with%20cases%20sent%20from%20earthquake%20zone%20in%20T%C3%BCrkiye.pdf.

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