The Jamal Khashoggi case and the UN's involvement

There is a general consensus worldwide that Turkey has passed a very good test in the Cemal Kaşıkçı murder and case. In a murder with an international dimension, where the usual suspects are the figures at the head of a state, a policy that did not take the path of protecting the suspects and covering up the incident, but kept open every route and channel so that the matter would come to light of its own accord, has constituted a model from which lessons can be drawn in every respect.

In this dimension, the incident should have conveyed to the whole world, in the best possible way, Turkey's state seriousness, dignity and sense of justice. However, at the stage we have reached in the incident, we still have neither Kaşıkçı's body nor any information on where he is and what happened to him. Moreover, judging by the aspects of the incident that have come to light, we are still very far from the point at which those who are the prime suspects of the murder will be held to account.

At this point a view has taken shape in everyone, almost to the degree of consensus: Turkey has done what it had to do, and has also seen that it has no possibility of bringing the culprits to justice with its own means. Domestic legal avenues and the political avenues between the two countries (Turkey and Saudi Arabia) appear almost exhausted in terms of obtaining a result in favor of justice. It is understood that the Saudi side has no intention of finding the culprits of the incident. Moreover, there is a strange situation in which the usual suspects of the incident are at the head of the judiciary. It is in any case impossible to expect justice from such a judiciary.

Yet there is no need to accept the situation as it stands. For the matter to be closed this way would wound consciences, deeply shake the sense of justice in the world, and dull hopes. It would leave no room for any hope that such incidents will not happen again.

Since domestic law and the political paths of resolution between the two countries are blocked, there is no option left other than international justice for the justice that we cannot give up to be realized somehow. Steps need to be taken that will bring BM into this matter.

There is a strong world public opinion that sees the Kaşıkçı case as a matter of humanity, and on its behalf there are those who do not consent to this matter being closed in this way.

BM Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions Agnes Callamard and the delegation accompanying her have been in Turkey for some time to investigate and report on the Kaşıkçı murder in all its dimensions. You will have followed it in the press. The delegation, which includes names such as Baroness Helena Kennedy, a member of the House of Lords in Britain, and Paul Johnson, a Senior Investigating Officer who currently provides consultancy on murder cases, held meetings with Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, Justice Minister Abdulhamit Gül, MİT Undersecretary Hakan Fidan, Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor İrfan Fidan, Cemal Kaşıkçı's fiancée Hatice Cengiz and Turan Kışlakçı. The delegation also visited me at the AK Parti Headquarters, and we held a meeting that lasted a full hour and a half.

I can say this much: because their hearts could not consent to the Kaşıkçı case being closed in this way, they took the initiative themselves and set about this investigation. They see the incident entirely on a humane and conscientious plane, and they have no prejudices.

Of course there is a limit to what they can do. They have no judicial or sanctioning power. In the end they will write a report and present it both to BM and to world public opinion. At this stage even this is no small thing, but their own main expectation and demand is that Turkey take a step and take the initiative in this matter. Because initiating action over such a crime that took place in its sphere of sovereignty is first and foremost Turkey's right, but now it is a duty and a responsibility.

ARE SCHOLARS NOT THE PROPERTY OF KINGS?

Of course, while speaking about this murder that Saudi Arabia saw fit to inflict on someone like Cemal Kaşıkçı in its own consulate, we must not keep our eyes, our attention and our consciences away from the many Kaşıkçı cases unfolding in their country at the same time.

It was announced in recent days that Sheikh Ahmed el-Amari, one of the ulema, who had served as Dean of the Faculty of the Holy Qur'an at the Islamic University of Medina and who had been detained in Saudi Arabia six months ago, died in prison owing to medical negligence. Amari's death in prison could not be regarded as a natural death, because no emergency intervention was deliberately made for the clot that formed in his cerebral vessels, and this caused his death.

If no measures are taken, it is highly likely that in the coming days we will receive other news of unfortunate deaths from the prisons, because there are many more detainees, advanced in age and all of them from among the ulema, and their health is deteriorating day by day in the very poor conditions of the prisons. In fact, holding them in prison at this age and in these health conditions amounts directly to execution. Although these scholars, among whom are names with very popular followings such as Süleyman el-Ulvan and Selman Avde, are citizens of Saudi Arabia, they are in fact children of the entire Islamic world.

In a program on an Arab channel in recent days evaluating these detainees and the human rights violations, the statements of a Saudi citizen were truly chilling. In response to all these allegations of rights violations, the only thing the Saudi citizen said was, "These are Saudi Arabia's internal affair, and as an independent country it will not let anyone interfere with its right of sovereignty."

This approach of an administration that is expected to be the servant of the lands where the life of the Prophet, sent as a mercy to the worlds, took place, and where the Farewell Sermon was recited as a first and most powerful declaration of human rights, is truly extra terrifying.

From this land, let alone the human rights violations in its own country, a sensitivity is expected that could not remain indifferent even to human rights violations in other countries.

Because being the servant of the Two Holy Mosques means, above all, being the servant of human dignity. Because the most sacred (haram) domain in the world is human dignity and rights.

It is frightening enough even to think that an approach that regards its own citizens as property to dispose of as it pleases is currently in control of the Two Holy Mosques.

Moreover, the scholars are not the property of the monarchy; they are children of the whole Islamic nation, heirs of the Prophets.