About
Kerem Altıparmak worked as a seniour lecturer in human rights law at Ankara University Faculty of Political Sciences until his resignation in October 2018. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Ankara University Faculty of Law, a master’s degree in public law from the same university, and a Ph.D. from Leeds University. Altıparmak also served as the Director of the AU SBF Human Rights Centre until it was closed down at the end of 2017. He has been involved in numerous projects with human rights organisations outside the university and has been working under the umbrella of the Human Rights Joint Platform since 2007 on various projects, including Monitoring the Implementation of ECtHR Judgments in Turkey and From Impunity to Accountability. Altıparmak, together with Prof. Dr. Yaman Akdeniz from Istanbul Bilgi University, founded the Freedom of Expression Association and has provided legal support to victims of freedom of expression rights such as journalists, human rights defenders, and academics; trained lawyers and set up law clinics to support digital activists and members of civil society organizations in exercising their rights to freedom of expression, assembly and association in Turkey. Altıparmak and Akdeniz also succeeded in having the blocking of YouTube and Twitter in Turkey lifted by the Constitutional Court in 2014 and another blocking of YouTube lifted by the ECtHR in 2015.
Altıparmak is the co-founder of the Freedom of Expression Association, currently works as a legal consultant to the International Commission of Jurists, and is a member of Ankara Bar Association.
Altıparmak has received the following awards for his works: Turkish Publishers Association Award (2014), Halit Çelenk Legal Prize (2015), Columbia Global Freedom of Expression Award (2016), Press Association of Turkey Press Freedom Prize (2016) and Franco-German Prize for Human Rights & the Rule of Law (2017). Kerem Altıparmak continues to work on the European Convention on Human Rights, freedom of expression, prevention of torture, rights theory, and impunity.
