Hi everyone,

As many of you will recall, in 2019 we filed a petition with the European Court of Human Rights https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2019/05/23/wikimedia-foundation-petitions-the-european-court-of-human-rights-to-lift-the-block-of-wikipedia-in-turkey/ to lift the nearly three-year block of Wikipedia in Turkey. While the block was lifted in 2020 following a ruling https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2019/12/26/turkish-constitutional-court-rules-that-the-two-and-a-half-year-block-of-wikipedia-is-unconstitutional/ from the Turkish Constitutional Court, our case proceeded in order to evaluate whether the Turkish law used to issue the block violated free expression rights. Our objective was to utilize the case to further our efforts to protect the Wikimedia projects and free knowledge more broadly from censorship going forward.

Today, the European Court of Human Rights announced https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/eng#%7B%22itemid%22:[%22003-7293454-9940966%22]%7D that it is dismissing the case, while still recognizing the importance of our concerns at the time of our filing. It cited three reasons for this dismissal: 1) the block was lifted in 2020; 2) the block was deemed a human rights violation by the Turkish Constitutional Court in its December 2019 ruling https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2019/12/26/turkish-constitutional-court-rules-that-the-two-and-a-half-year-block-of-wikipedia-is-unconstitutional/; and 3) the Court believes the Turkish Constitutional Court capable of effectively addressing future problems related to violations of free expression online. Additionally, the Court provided guidance that the over two years taken by the Turkish Constitutional Court to address the violation may in the future be seen as an excessive delay for governments to take action in cases of website blocking.

Because our primary goal when we filed the case was to restore access to Wikipedia in Turkey, we understand the Court’s decision and still see this outcome as a win. The Court acknowledged a human rights violation in our case, and affirmed that restoring access was an important step in addressing the violation.

However, we also recognize that this ruling comes at a time when access to knowledge continues to be under threat around the world, including in Russia where authorities recently demanded the removal of content on Wikipedia https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2022/03/03/wikimedia-foundation-stands-with-communities-defending-free-knowledge/ related to the Russian government’s invasion of Ukraine. We will continue to work with you all to defend the right of everyone to freely access and participate in knowledge, today and into the future.

Read more about the decision in our statement https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2022/03/24/european-court-of-human-rights-case-dismissed/ and help amplify the message using our social media resources on Diff https://diff.wikimedia.org/2022/03/24/european-court-of-human-rights-dismisses-case-about-block-of-wikipedia-in-turkey/ .

Best,

Leighanna Mixter