Osman Mümtaz Soysal (15 September 1929 – 11 November 2019) was a Turkish professor of constitutional law, political scientist, politician, human rights activist, ex-prisoner of conscience, senior advisor, columnist, and author.
He was elected to Amnesty International International Executive Committee in September 1974 as the first Turkish and the first ex-prisoner of conscience member ever. He served as the vice-chairman of Amnesty International from 1976 to 1978. He became the first winner of the UNESCO Prize for Human Rights Education in 1978.
As a hard-line Kemalist statist, Mümtaz Soysal persistently worked against privatisation policies and initiatives of Turkish governments, especially in the 1990s. He founded Center for Development of Public Enterprise in April 1994, and the organisation was converted to a foundation in 1996.
Soysal became involved in left-wing politics as one of the founders of Yön, a left-wing political magazine founded in 1961.[3] He also became the dean of SBF, which was known at the time for its leftist politics.
Arrest
The 1971 military coup ended his tenure as dean and later led to his detention. He was also the editor-in-chief of a newly founded weekly political magazine, Ortam, when he was arrested.[4] He was arrested and charged with making communist propaganda. For this, he was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison and a lifetime ban from public office. He served just over 14 months of the sentence and later received a pardon.[2] For his detention, he was listed as an Amnesty Internationalprisoner of conscience.[5] In 1974, he became the first former prisoner of conscience to serve on the International Executive Committee of Amnesty International.[6] He served on the organization’s board until 1976, becoming its vice chairman.
Soysal wrote columns for the daily Milliyet between 1974 and 1991,[7] for Hürriyet between 1991 and 2001,[8] and for Cumhuriyet after 2001.[7]
Personal life
He was married to Sevgi Soysal (until her death in 1976). Later he married Sevinç Karasapan Soysal who was the daughter of Celal Tevfik Karasapan.[9] He had two daughters, Defne (1973) and Funda (1975) and two step-sons.
