To this end, the government plans to amend the articles of the Turkish Penal Code (TCK) concerning the right to privacy and the illegal wiretapping of private phone conversations. With the amendments, the severity of punishments for illegal wiretapping will be increased. “With the passage of this draft legislation the punishment [for illegal wiretapping] will be increased three-fold. The punishments will not be suspended or commuted to monetary fine. People who are found guilty of illegal wiretapping will be sentenced to a jail term of two to five years. There is no other method to put a stop to the illegal wiretapping paranoia,” Yıldırım told Today’s Zaman. The wiretapping of telephone conversations is a highly controversial issue in Turkey. Many believe the police as well as the military and other security agencies frequently bug people’s phone lines to detect security threats.
According to Yıldırım, no individual or body, save for the gendarmerie, police and National Intelligence Organization (MİT), is entitled to tap telephone conversations. “The wiretapping of telephone conversations is an issue widely disputed throughout the entire world. There is also the widespread belief in Turkish society that telephone conversations are illegally wiretapped. This is unacceptable in terms of the freedom of communication,” he noted.
The minister also said there was not a law against illegal wiretapping in Turkey before 2006.
Illegal wiretapping returned to Turkey’s agenda last month when police discovered clips featuring phone conversations of dozens of prominent figures in Turkey at the house of Hanefi Avcı, the former police chief of the central province of Eskişehir. Many people testified to civilian prosecutors about the conversations and filed criminal complaints against Avcı.
Yıldırım also said he was illegally wiretapped in the past. “We need to pass the planned legislation in Parliament as soon as possible,” he added.
