European Court of Human Rights hit by Turkish cyber attack
QAMISHLI, Syria (North Press) – The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) announced on Wednesday that its website was the subject of a large-scale cyberattack which has made it temporarily inaccessible.
No data was lost, a court spokesperson told the French news agency AFP, despite the fact that the attack was a major one.
The Court strongly condemned the incident, and added that they are currently making every effort to remedy the situation as soon as possible.
The attack came only hours after the issuance of a Tuesday ruling condemning the government of Turkey for detaining pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) MP Selahattin Demirtas without trial since 2016.
Turkey had stripped Demirtas of his parliamentary immunity, and he was arrested alongside 11 members of HDP accused of terrorism-related crimes.
The Commissioner for Human Rights stated that upholding the right to freedom of expression was “currently all the more difficult as a result of a marked erosion of the independence and impartiality of the judiciary in Turkey.”
The Grand Chamber judgment of the Court found that there had been violations against freedom of expression, the right to liberty and security, and the right to free elections in Demirtas’ case.
The Court stressed that the justification for his years of detention was “a cover to limit pluralism and democratic debate.”
Turkish hackers claim responsibility
Meanwhile, a group of Turkish hackers called Anka Neferler Tim claimed responsibility for hacking ECHR’s website, disrupting it for hours, saying that their attack came in response to the court’s Tuesday decision.
The hacker team said it was a volunteer effort to defend the Turkish regime, and the group claimed the cyberattack on Twitter, demanding the court apologize for the ruling.
The same group had announced earlier that it targeted Greek government sites when tension escalated between the two governments.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned the ECHR’s call for the immediate release of the prominent Kurdish dissident, pointing out that all domestic legal avenues were “yet to be exhausted.”