Ferdi Colak v Government of Türkiye

This is an extradition case. What I have had to decide is whether to grant permission to appeal on any of the four grounds which have been raised. The Appellant is aged 46 and is wanted for extradition to Türkiye. The extradition Request issued by the Government of Türkiye was dated 16.6.17. It was certified by the Home Secretary, pursuant to s.70 of the Extradition Act 2003, on 20.2.18. The Appellant’s extradition arrest was on 11.6.18 and he was granted bail on 11.10.18. The Request is a conviction request which describes criminal proceedings in Türkiye on a three-count indictment, all arising out of events on 21 August 2013. The three counts were: (1) kidnap; (2) sexual assault; and (3) threats. They all related to the same victim. There have been various stays, for various reasons, including because of asylum and human rights claims and appeals, and because the judgments in Demir v Türkiye (No.1) [2024] EWHC 2351 (Admin) and Demir v Türkiye (No.2) [2024] EWHC 3055 (Admin) were awaited.

The extradition proceedings culminated in a 3-day oral hearing in April 2021 in the Westminster Magistrates’ Court, before District Judge Tempia (“the Judge”). The Judge produced a comprehensive 50-page and 176-paragraph judgment (the “Judgment”). The Appellant’s application for permission to appeal was refused on the papers, and is now renewed. The viability of the appeal involves a test of reasonable arguability. The renewal hearing was listed and accessible by MS Teams, a mode of hearing which I am satisfied involved no risk of prejudice to any party or to open justice. I was assisted by written and oral submissions by Counsel on behalf of both parties.

At the April 2021 3-day hearing before the Judge, the Appellant gave evidence and was cross-examined. There were also four specialist witnesses who were called by the Appellant’s legal team. They each gave oral evidence and were questioned by the advocates on both sides, and by the Judge. Ms Saniye Karakas, a human rights specialist, had produced reports dated October 2020 and April 2021. Professor Rod Morgan, a criminal justice specialist, had produced reports dated September 2018, October 2020 and April 2021. Professor William Bowring, another human rights specialist, had produced reports dated December 2018, October 2020 and April 2021. Professor Cornelius Katona, a consultant psychiatrist, had produced a report dated January 2019 and gave oral evidence which included describing his reassessment dated April 2021. There were several strands of admissible Further Information adduced by the Respondent. The Judge set out the substance of all of this evidence, with care, comprehensiveness and clarity. Her description of the evidence can be traced and linked through to her analysis of the issues.

The outcome of the case before the Judge was as follows. She ordered that two of the offences from the three-count indictment described in the certified extradition Request, be discharged pursuant to s.78(3) of the Act. These were the sexual assault and the threats. The discharge was because the Request, and the certificate, was to be understood as including only the conviction and the sentence on the first of the 3 counts: kidnap. The reason was this. As was explained in the Request itself, by the time it was issued on 16.6.17 a domestic appeal court in Türkiye had affirmed the kidnap conviction and sentence (9 years imprisonment), but had quashed and remitted the convictions and sentences for the sexual assault (12 years imprisonment) and threats (3 years imprisonment). Independently of the Request it was known that the Appellant had, on the remitted reconsideration, been reconvicted and resentenced for the sexual assault (9 years imprisonment) and the threats (2 years imprisonment), by determination dated 4.5.17 which was subsequently approved and became final on 28.11.18. But, held the Judge, that did not bring the new convictions and sentences for sexual assault and threats within the scope of the certified Request. In those circumstances the requirements of s.78(4)(c) were not met. The Judge’s order for discharge on the offences of sexual assault and threats was clear and explicit. She sent the case to the Home Secretary, but only on the kidnap offence, rejecting the Appellant’s various grounds of resistance to extradition. On 21.6.21 the Home Secretary ordered the Appellant’s extradition pursuant to s.93(4) for “the charge” within the Request: ie. the kidnap only.

The Appellant had been arrested by the Turkish police on 22.8.13. He was later detained in Hatay Prison on remand, until being released on 8.6.14. His trial was in the Iskenderen criminal court. He attended a pre-trial hearing in person on 7.5.15. His trial was scheduled for, and subsequently took place on, 7.7.15. He was legally represented. But he did not attend. In addressing an issue under s.85 – conviction in absence and re-trial rights – the Judge unimpeachably found that he was “deliberately absent” at his July 2015 trial. That was fatal to his invocation of s.85 to resist extradition. The Judge also recorded that the Iskenderen criminal court had, by a judgment dated 8.2.21 guaranteed the Appellant a retrial, if promptly requested by him post-surrender, on the kidnap offence at the Iskenderen criminal court.

After his convictions and sentences in his absence on 7.7.15, and acting on his instructions, the Appellant’s Turkish lawyer pursued an appeal. The Appellant left Türkiye in August or September 2015. The appeal was subsequently heard in his absence. It was partly successful. On 17.1.17, the conviction and sentence in the kidnap matter were upheld and became final; but the sexual assault and threats matters were quashed on 17.1.17 and remitted. That led to the subsequent trial on 4.5.17, when he was again convicted of the sexual assault and the threats, again in his absence. The sentences passed were different: 9 years for the sexual assault and 2 years for the threats. But the original conviction and 9 year sentence for the kidnap remained undisturbed, having been upheld and having become final on 17.1.17.

In his evidence before the Judge the Appellant made claims about ill-treatment at the hands of the Turkish authorities on and after his arrest on 22.8.13. The Judge found that he did not raise these through any complaints mechanism or with any court in Türkiye. The claims as to ill-treatment were summarised by the Judge: on arrest, he was taken to a police mini-van and was kicked and punched; that at the police station he was beaten up, a truncheon was inserted up his anus, he was sworn at and insulted; that he was later sent to a prison designated for rapists where he was forced to sleep outside the toilets and had restrictions placed on him, and was humiliated when his wife visited and a prison guard simulated masturbation. These were claims which had been treated as true by Professor Katona, forming an important basis for diagnosed PTSD. The Judge did not make any specific findings of fact as to whether the ill-treatment had taken place. As Mr Evans submitted, the Judge took the Appellant’s evidence at its highest. The Judge emphasised that the principal ill-treatment had been at the hands of the police, and particularly in a police station, rather than a prison; that the ill-treatment in Hatay prison was linked to incarceration as a sex offender (because of the sexual assault count); and that post-extradition incarceration would be in the very different environment of Yalvac Prison. These points were all plainly open to the Judge and she was not even arguably wrong in making and emphasising them.

Professor Katona in his January 2019 report had diagnosed PTSD, with a secondary diagnosis of depression. An overall score of the severity of the mental health conditions was 30/40 in January 2019. In his April 2021 reassessment, Professor Katona assessed that in addition to PTSD the Appellant now also had a major depressive disorder as well as an alcohol use disorder. The overall score was now 36/40, in April 2021. Relied on before me as putative fresh evidence – albeit written for asylum and immigration proceedings – is a June 2025 further psychiatric report of Professor Katona. As Mr Evans demonstrated, the June 2025 Katona report needs to be read with care. It is describing deterioration, by reference to the January 2019 report. It does not focus on the April 2021 assessment, or what the Judgment recorded was Professor Katona’s oral evidence when questioned at the hearing before the Judge. The overall score as at June 2025 is given by Professor Katona as 32/40. That is higher than January 2019, but lower than April 2021. The key themes are closely similar to what Professor Katona was saying at the April 2021 hearing, where the Judge had the benefit of scrutiny of the evidence through the mechanism of that hearing.

Another feature of the extradition proceedings was this. It was disclosed by the Respondent in Further Information dated 26 January 2021 that there were extant domestic proceedings against the Appellant in Türkiye relating to tax and property matters. Included within putative fresh evidence in the form of a January 2026 report of Ali Yildiz, another criminal justice and human rights specialist, is a description of steps taken in Türkiye in the further pursuit of the alleged tax offences.

Another piece of the jigsaw related to Yalvac Assurances. The Demir judgments in July and November 2024 addressed the issue of Article 3 and Turkish prison conditions. They dealt with a point which Mr Cooper KC sought to deploy, about published and non-published CPT reports (Demir No.1 §13). Yalvac prison comprises two modern prison facilities assessed in pre-Demir cases as suitable for Art 3-compatible extradition, based on suitable commitments in Assurances. Demir identified stronger Yalvac Assurances, required in light of a track record of previous breaches, when surrendered requested persons spent periods in other prisons notwithstanding Yalvac Assurances. In the present case there is a set of March 2025 Yalvac Assurances, dated 7.3.25, which stand as putative fresh evidence but on which it is plainly appropriate to grant the Respondent permission to rely, as I do.

It is common ground that the March 2025 Yalvac Assurances reflect the general rigours required by Demir, subject only to the controversy about the Uckac Assurance. The March 2025 Yalvac Assurances in the present case include these guarantees:

I have decided to grant permission to appeal, limited to a narrow and specific question.

I consider it reasonably arguable that the answer to that Question is “yes”, whether it be Answers (a), (b) or (c). I envisage that the substantive hearing, to deal with this narrow and self-contained issue can be dealt with as a ½ day hearing with a slimmed bundle of factual and legal materials and crisp skeleton arguments. I expect the Respondent will want to consider whether it wishes to put forward Assurances revised to include this additional content, in which case the matter could be capable of resolution without further argument.

As I will explain, I am concerned in particular by this: if the Appellant is extradited on the Yalvac Assurances without modification, there is a potential conflict with any ability of the Iskenderun trial court to permit or require any in-person attendance at the guaranteed retrial, while at the same time acting consistently with the Assurances including guaranteed personal space, which Demir says is necessary.

Mr Cooper KC and Mr Stansfeld submitted that it is reasonably arguable that the additional Uckac Assurance is a legally necessary component of the Yalvac Assurances in securing the Article 3-compatibility of the Appellant’s extradition, given the way that a known guaranteed right of retrial features in this case. In the alternative, they say it is reasonably arguable that an alternative solution is legally necessary. I agree with them on the arguability of those points.

None of this involves any criticism of the Judge. She was not invited to adopt either of these courses. Demir had not yet been decided. The Judge recorded Professor Morgan’s evidence about the distance from Yalvac prison and the Iskenderun court where the Appellant’s re-trial would take place; that it would be impracticable for him to be transported on a regular basis for his trial; that it was conceivable he could attend his trial via video link; but that in normal circumstances if he stood trial in Iskenderun court he would be held at a prison in Iskenderun. The Judge recorded Professor Bowring’s evidence that there was no reason to doubt that there were facilities at Yalvac Prison for video link. In the context of Article 6, the Judge recorded an additional submission of the Respondent’s Counsel (not Mr Evans) that “Yalvac prison has [video-link] facilities and in the case of Yilmaz & Yilmaz v Turkey [2019] EWHC 1939 (Admin) at §§14-19, the High Court held that the availability of video link facilities at the prison to allow prisoners to appear remotely for the trials was not a breach of Article 6”. The Judge found that there was no flagrant denial of fair hearing rights in the Turkish proceedings leading to the kidnap conviction, nor any risk of flagrant denial of fair hearing rights as to the guaranteed retrial. She also recorded the Respondent’s primary position was that Article 6 had no prospective application (ie. to the retrial), because this is a conviction Request case.

Mr Evans submitted that no arguable point arises. He says the Yalvac Assurances satisfy any Article 3 concern. There is no question of the Appellant being held at a prison, closer to the retrial venue, without the guarantee of personal space, or indeed at all. That is because of the clear and unqualified terms of the Yalvac Assurances put forward. By reason of guarantee [i], the Appellant must be held at Yalvac. He cannot be elsewhere for the purposes of attending the retrial. Holding him elsewhere would place the Government of Türkiye in breach of the Yalvac Assurances. It is known that video-link facilities are available at Yalvac. The Appellant will have to give his instructions, observe the trial, and give any evidence by video-link. But that can be done. It will have to be done. It will be compatible with Article 3. No problem arises. Nothing more is needed.

This may prove to be correct, but I have not been persuaded that it is a knock-out blow. My reasons are as follows.

I am not granting or refusing permission for any putative fresh evidence on this issue. My provisional view is that points about the geographical distance of Iskenderun from Yalvac and the practicalities of travel appear at the retrial were already in evidence in the present case – as the Judge recorded – I doubt whether any relevant content of the putative fresh evidence of Mr Yildiz on this issue could satisfy the fresh evidence test of being capable of being dispositive. Mr Yildiz spells out that the distance from Yalvac to Iskenderun is 630km, taking at least 7 hours one way by car, and longer in a prison van. Whether this or any other aspect of the report assists the Court dealing with the substantive hearing is best left for that Court to decide.

I am refusing permission to appeal on this issue. The Appellant relies on s.81 of the 2003 Act: extraneous considerations. It is common ground that the Judge identified the relevant law and the relevant legal test. The question was whether there were reasonable grounds for believing that he would if extradited be punished, detained or restricted in his personal liberty because of his Kurdish ethnicity, his Alevi religion and/or his political opinions. The Judge decided there were not. In my judgment, it is not reasonably arguable that she was wrong or that putative fresh evidence shows the conclusion now to have been wrong.

The Judge set out in detail the evidence which was relevant to this issue. She considered the previous events described in the evidence, the expert evidence provided, and the open source material. She accepted that the Appellant is Kurdish and of Alevi religion. She recorded his evidence that he had never been a member of a political party but had been a supporter of a party involved at a low level, and that he had gone to Syria after his release on remand on 8.6.14, for 3 to 4 days. She identified his claim that the attitude of the Turkish judges was prejudiced against him because of state pressure after he made that visit to Syria. She identified his complaint about prejudice from a judicial observation about his having consumed alcohol during the incident on 21.8.13. The Judge considered and addressed these points. She considered and addressed the relevant evidence. She identified that the Appellant’s political activities were at a low level, and that the visit to Syria was for a short period of a few days. She identified that the criminal charges levelled against the Appellant were in nature non-political. She considered all the evidence from the experts. She described the evidence of the framework of legal protections against discrimination. She recognised the part-success of the appeal, and the replacement sentences on reconviction. She recorded Professor Bowring’s evidence about a real risk that the Appellant did not have a fair trial if the criminal court had been aware of the trip to Syria, but also Professor Bowring’s acceptance that there was no evidence to suggest that the Appellant was discriminated against, and no actual evidence to indicate any judicial awareness of the Syria trip. The Judge discussed the evidence of Ms Karakas describing a strong possibility that the Appellant faced prejudice during his trial in Türkiye due to his political opinion, and her evidence that there is prejudice stigma and discrimination against Kurds by Turkish law enforcement officers, prosecutors and courts. But as the Judge also recorded, Ms Karakas agreed under cross-examination that Turkish law prohibits discrimination as set out in the Constitution, that she hadn’t observed any of the hearings of the Appellant, that there were no explicit statements indicating any discrimination in any of the judgments of the courts in his case.

The Judge concluded that, having evaluated all the evidence including the expert witnesses, she did not find reasonable grounds for believing that the Appellant would be discriminated against because of his ethnicity, his religion, or his political views. She found the expert evidence to be generalised about the Kurdish and Alevi communities. The charges faced were non-political, the Appellant was represented throughout, and he had appealed at various stages and successfully so in relation to two of the three offences which were remitted for rehearing. She found that there was no evidence to suggest that the trip to Syria, nor changes in Türkiye after an attempted coup in 2016, prejudiced or influenced the judiciary in convicting the Appellant. She recorded that the Appellant suspected judicial bias in a change in attitude but that there was no evidence to substantiate this apart from suspicion and the generality of expert evidence about treatment of Kurds and those of the Alevi religion and those with certain political views. She concluded that there was nothing to show that the Appellant would be prejudiced at any retrial because of his ethnicity, or religion, or political views. The context for this analysis included the Judge’s earlier description of laws in place concerning the execution of penalties and security measures to be implemented without discrimination, and a detailed description in the case of each witness and expert of the evidence they had given in reports and what they had said under questioning.

I can see no realistic prospect that this court at a substantive hearing would overturn the Judge’s assessment on this issue as having been wrong. There is no realistic prospect that this court would conclude that the Judge’s assessment has become wrong by reason of any of the putative fresh evidence. Nor did this ground of appeal gain traction by Mr Cooper KC’s oral submissions seeking to refocus the point on the ill-treatment on arrest and on remand. It is not reasonably arguable that the Judge needed to make concrete findings of fact. The Judge was very well aware of what was claimed, what the Appellant said about it, and what the expert witnesses were saying. She focused in the right place. She dealt with the evidence that was relevant and being relied on, in informing her decision as to risk and the future. I refuse permission to appeal on this issue.

The arguments advanced on behalf the Appellant on abuse of extradition process were, in essence, as follows. Pursuant to the Judgment and the order of the Home Secretary, the Appellant would be being extradited only in relation to the kidnap matter. So far as the sexual assault and the threats are concerned, the Judge has expressly discharged those two matters. There was, and has been, no fresh or replacement extradition Request including those two matters, notwithstanding the reconviction and resentencing on 4.5.17 and that having become final on 28.11.18. So far as the tax and property matters are concerned, disclosed in the extradition proceedings on 26.1.21, there is evidence that they are still being pursued. Yet they have never been brought within any extradition Request or process. That means there has been action by the Turkish authorities after the Appellant’s extradition arrest on 11.6.18. It is prejudicial because it evidences a wish to pursue matters without bringing them within the extradition process. This denies the Appellant the chance of mounting a pre-surrender defence before a judicial authority, with legal representation. There is the clear prospect, supported by the evidence of Ms Karakas, that following a surrender the Appellant will find himself facing serving the sentences for the sex assault and the threats, and facing trial in relation to the tax and property matters. Even if the Turkish authorities used the specialty mechanism of seeking post-surrender consent, that is an unfairly inferior procedural mechanism for a requested person. The speciality consent mechanism should in principle be reserved for matters not known about at the time of extradition surrender but which have subsequently come to light. All of which means, reasonably arguably, there is an extradition abuse of process as a bar to extradition, as illustrated by the case of Bartlett v Belgium [2012] EWHC 2480 (Admin) at §§31 and 34. Knowing that the Appellant was under arrest and facing extradition, the Turkish authorities have chosen to pursue matters domestically without bringing them within the forum of the extradition request. That circumvents the safeguards and protections of extradition proceedings. The extradition court should at minimum be requiring from the Respondent some sort of undertaking or assurance.

Arguments based on prejudice from the Turkish authorities simply proceeding to enforce the sentences for the sexual offence and the threats, and simply proceeding with the tax and property matters, were fully ventilated before the Judge and addressed by her. The Judge rightly recognised that it really came to this: that there was reason to suppose that Turkey would breach the applicable specialty prohibition. Mr Evans showed me the clear and express terms of the prohibition in the European Convention on Extradition Article 14 (the rule of speciality), with its clear prohibition on any proceeding or sentence or implementation of sentence committed prior to surrender other than that for which the requested person was extradited, unless the extraditing party (here, the Home Secretary) gives consent. The Judge concluded that there was no evidenced reason to suppose that Turkey would breach the prohibition.

In my judgment, the Judge’s reasoning and her conclusion were unimpeachable. They are not undermined by any putative further evidence, and there is no realistic prospect that this court at a substantive hearing would overturn her conclusion as having been wrong. The legal position of Türkiye as the requesting state is expressly regulated by a treaty provision, found in the rule of speciality in Article 14. The terms of that prohibition are clear and express. Article 14 does not say, as it could have done, that the consent mechanism is available only in respect of an offence of which the authorities become aware after surrender. I was shown no authority or commentary which says that is what it means or that is how it must be applied in order to avoid abuse of process or circumvention. These are extradition treaty arrangements, founded on mutual trust and respect. As the Judge emphasised, none of the expert witnesses were able to point to a single example of any breach of these treaty commitments by the Turkish authorities. As she also pointed out, the express terms of the Request contain contents which show that the Turkish authorities are aware of specialty provisions and protections.

The citation of Bartlett did not engage with what that case actually decided. It is a case which needs to be read in the light of Belbin v France [2015] EWHC 149 (Admin), with which I was provided. The law summarised in Belbin is this. In order to establish an extradition abuse of process, the requested person would need to satisfy the extradition court on cogent evidence that the relevant requesting state authority has acted so as to usurp the statutory extradition regime or impugn its integrity: see Belbin §59. Proceeding to a trial in absence is not itself an extradition abuse, even where the requested person’s absence is because they are awaiting extradition: see Belbin §55. In Bartlett there was a usurpation or manipulation because the Belgian prosecutor had, by a misleadingly incomplete application, persuaded the High Court in London to exercise its statutory power to extend time for the requested person’s surrender under an accusation Extradition Arrest Warrant: see Belbin §§56-57. If surrender had proceeded without that delay, since a money-laundering offence had been discharged for lack of particulars, the specialty mechanism would have been applicable to any pursuit in France of that matter: see Bartlett §§31(i), 31(viii). That is what should have happened: see Bartlett §31(vi). Those post-surrender specialty safeguards should have applied: see Bartlett §31(ix). In the present case, the sexual assault and threats have been discharged; the requesting state authorities are proceeding under the same Request; and the specialty mechanism and safeguards are applicable to any pursuit of them post-surrender. Bartlett does not assist the Appellant.

On this final issue, the Appellant relies on s.91 and the test of oppression on the basis of a mental health condition, but also the threshold for Article 3. The central focus has been and still is on risk of suicide, but Mr Cooper KC also advanced a freestanding point on PTSD deterioration. The Appellant’s mental health condition was addressed in Professor Katona’s January 2019 report, his April 2021 reassessment, and his oral evidence to the Judge including his response to questioning. It is now addressed in the putative fresh evidence of his June 2025 report (Katona June 2025).

It is common ground that the Judge got the law right. She set out the propositions from Turner v United States [2012] EWHC 2426 (Admin) at §29. As to those, I was shown the discussion in Modi v India [2022] EWHC 2829 (Admin) at §§128-129. Turner told the Judge: that she needed to form an overall judgment on the facts the particular case; that a high threshold of oppression had to be reached; that there needed to be a substantial risk that the requested person will commit suicide, through an act which – by reason of the mental health condition – cannot be described as voluntary; that she had to consider whether it has been demonstrated that appropriate arrangements have been put in place in the relevant prison system, so that the authorities can cope properly with the requested person’s mental condition and the risk of suicide; and that the court asks whether, on the evidence, the risk of the requested person succeeding in committing suicide “whatever steps are taken” is sufficiently great to result in a finding of oppression.

It is clear in my judgment, beyond reasonable argument, that the Judge faithfully applied those legal principles to the facts and circumstances and evidence in the present case, reaching the requisite overall judgment. She found that the high threshold was not crossed. The evidenced picture had the following components. It was recorded by the Judge and is described in the Katona June 2025:

Alongside this, there were other features of the evidence which the Judge identified and addressed. The Appellant had not (and still has not) had any mental health treatments. There had not been (and still have not been) any acts of self-harm or attempted suicide. There was evidence about the mental health treatment for prisoners in Turkey. As the Judge recorded, Professor Katona accepted having no knowledge about this. The Judge described the considerable amount of information from the Turkish authorities about what is in place in Yalvac prison. There was the information from the Turkish authorities about the provision made in prison settings and at Yalvac Prison specifically. The evidence explained that prisoners with mental health issues are regulated by a physician; they are treated in the prison for mental health issues; those who need further examination or treatment are referred to a state hospital; those who have the risk of committing suicide are to be taken under close monitoring, which includes constant monitoring, and individual therapy. There was the evidence in the expert reports and in their oral evidence which commented on those arrangements. There was the fact, emphasised by the Judge, that Yalvac Prison is a different environment from the police station and the incarceration as a sex offender at Hatay prison. The Judge assessed that provisions were in place to assist those who pose a threat of suicide and which will mitigate any threat of self-harm and suicide; that there are suitable medical services provided to prisoners; that prisoners with PTSD and poor mental health are regulated by doctors; that treatment is provided to treat them; and that those who need further examination and treatment are referred to hospitals if required. The Judge was satisfied as to the effectiveness of the arrangements, which were sufficient to mitigate against suicide, and which could treat the PTSD and depression.

I have been unable to see a realistic prospect that this Court at a substantive hearing would overturn the Judge’s conclusion as to risk of suicide and the application of the Turner principles. Not having carefully considered the contents of the Katona June 2025 – as to which see §8 above – can I see a realistic prospect that this court at a substantive hearing would conclude that the Judge’s evaluation has become wrong by reason of fresh evidence or new developments. It is plain that the Judge’s evaluative conclusion, on the evidence, was that the risk of the Appellant succeeding in committing suicide, in light of the steps taken, was not sufficiently great to result in a finding of oppression. That conclusion was not in my judgment arguably wrong. Nor has it become arguably wrong. For the same reasons, there is no arguable Article 3 appeal based on mental health.

That leaves the attempts by Mr Cooper KC to mount the freestanding oppression argument based on PTSD and deterioration. The argument was as follows. The Appellant’s PTSD is assessed by Professor Katona to have arisen materially because of the experience of ill-treatment at the hands of the Turkish authorities within the police and prison service. Returning the Appellant to a prison environment, on the evidence of Professor Katona, would involve a likely deterioration in the Appellant’s PTSD, as to which it is very unlikely that there would be sufficient trust to successfully obtain specialist medical care. It is reasonably arguable that this constitutes oppression in the same way as did the circumstances of the cases of XY v Netherlands [2019] EWHC 624 (Admin) at §51 and ZA v Romania [2025] EWHC 595 (Admin) at §§42 and 44. Those were cases where the requested person was “suffering from a mental illness attributable to the failure of the requesting state’s authorities to keep him safe from attack” and return to “the very environment which triggered the PTSD in the first place”: see ZA at §42.

I accept that PTSD-deterioration and oppression can feature independently and alongside suicide risk: see ZA at §42. The cases are fact-specific. I can see no viable oppression (or Article 3) argument based on mental health condition, independently of the Turner suicide point. The evidence including what Professor Katona has said is not capable of sustaining such an argument. The Judge plainly did not regard the threshold of oppression as being met by the PTSD condition and its deterioration, independently of or alongside the risk of suicide. She emphasised the context and circumstances of the ill-treatment at the hands of the police, and in the police station, and on remand as a sex offender. She analysed the position as to the very different environment of Yalvac prison. It is not reasonably arguable that her conclusions on oppression or Article 3 by reason of mental health condition was wrong, or has become wrong by reason of Katona June 2025 or ZA. I will refuse permission to appeal on this ground of appeal.

I grant permission to appeal on one issue and defer to the substantive hearing the question of fresh evidence relevant to that issue. On everything else, I refuse permission to appeal and – it being incapable of being decisive – refuse permission for the fresh evidence. My Order was as follows, omitting administrative matters and case-management directions: (1) The Respondent is granted permission to rely on the Yalvac Assurances dated 7 March 2025. (2) The Appellant is granted permission to appeal on Article 3 ECHR, limited to the following question: Is it legally necessary in the present case for the Yalvac Assurances to address the Appellant’s guaranteed retrial, whether by (a) including the Uckac Assurance (Demir No.1 §97 and Annex §3) or (b) amending “because of security or disciplinary issues” to add “or in order to secure any in-person attendance at trial” or (c) otherwise? (3) The question whether the Appellant should have permission to adduce any of the January 2026 report of Ali Yildiz, as fresh evidence relevant to the issue in paragraph (2) above, is deferred to the substantive hearing. (4) Permission to appeal is refused on all other grounds and all other issues.