On 2 November 2018, 26 trade union members were criminally convicted for their part in a 2016 strike at a Renault factory in Bursa. The workers were found guilty of “disobeying the law on meetings and demonstrations" after taking part in a protest in front of Renault’s Oyak plant in March 2016.
The 2016 protest took place following a series of dismissals during a union campaign by members of the Birleşik Metal workers’ union. Renault had repeatedly refused to allow union elections to take place, and had fired ten workers including two worker spokespersons. The demonstrators were demanding the right to organise and that dismissed workers be reinstated. The protest was violently dispersed by police.
Twenty-six workers were sentenced to a five-month prison sentence, suspended for five years. Two people who had posted messages in support of the workers’ protest on social media were sentenced to prison terms of three years and four months for incitement.
