Tuna Altinel, mathematician and teacher at Lyon-1 University, still cannot leave Turkey due to the withholding of his passport.
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Yasin AKGUL / AFP
Tuna Altinel, mathematician at Lyon-1 University, has been stuck for nearly two years in Turkey, his country of origin.
Acquitted of the facts with which he was accused and which led to him being placed in detention and then tried in Turkey, Tuna Altinel has still not been able to recover his passport to return to Lyon.
The university voted a motion to support him and calls on Emmanuel Macron.
Fifteen months have passed since his acquittal but Tuna Altinel is still unable to leave Turkey.
The University of Lyon-I on Thursday called Emmanuel Macron to intervene in order to allow his mathematician to return to France, in a motion voted on as the two years of the retention of his passport by his country of origin approach.
“It has been almost two years since our colleague Tuna Altinel has been detained in Turkey, with the impossibility of returning to France to carry out his teaching-researcher missions where he is expected by his students, his colleagues and his establishment, the University. Claude-Bernard Lyon 1. On behalf of the entire university community, we would like to reaffirm our full support for it, ”it is written in the motion, voted on March 30 by the university's board of directors.
Incarcerated then tried
"We ask the President of the French Republic, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Minister of Higher Education, Research and Innovation to do everything possible so that our colleague, teacher-researcher and civil servant, position within our university, can return to France as soon as possible, ”she continues.
Tuna Altinel, lecturer at Claude-Bernard University, had his passport withdrawn on April 12, 2019 while he was on vacation in Turkey, accused of "belonging to a terrorist organization".
Incarcerated and then tried for "terrorist propaganda" for having participated in France in a meeting of a Kurdish friendly, during which he served as an interpreter, he was acquitted in January 2020. But Turkey still refuses to hand over his passport to him. .
After various representations to the courts and the Turkish authorities, the president of Lyon-I, Frédéric Fleury, once again "on October 16, 2020, sent a request for the return of the passport to the Turkish Ministry of the Interior, to the General Office of the Civil State of Turkey, and to the Administrative Decision Commission for Turkish Passports, ”said a statement.
For his colleagues from Lyon, who created a support committee, Tuna Altinel's situation is linked to the signing of a petition in 2016 from Academics for Peace in Turkey, which called for the end of operations in the south-east of the country. .
"He is a defender of human rights and someone very attached to his freedom of thought", assured Cécile Mercadier and Thomas Blossier, two representatives of his support committee, who denounced "psychological wear and tear" which he is about.
Society
Lyon: Three months after his acquittal, the teacher of the University of Lyon 1 remains blocked in Turkey
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Lyon: The teacher of the University of Lyon 1, detained in Turkey since May, was acquitted by the justice
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