The regulation on the Legal Professions Entrance Exam, which was brought by the Ministry of Justice as a prerequisite exam in which the qualifications, knowledge and skills of graduates of law faculties were evaluated, was published in the Official Gazette dated 08.05.2024 and numbered 3254o.With the regulation, the procedures and principles regarding the way the exam is held and other issues related to the exam have been determined.

The entrance exam to legal professions and the pre-examination of administrative justice will be applied to those who have enrolled in higher education institutions after 24.10.2019 and those who have graduated after 31.03.2024.

The conditions for taking the exam have been determined by Article 5 of the Regulation. According to the said article; 

- Those who graduated from the law faculty and those who graduated from a foreign law faculty and took the equivalence certificate by taking the exam from the missing courses according to the programs of law faculties in Turkey,

- Those who have graduated from foreign educational institutions that have at least four years of higher education in the fields of political science, administrative sciences, economics and finance, which have sufficiently included the Administrative Judicial Preliminary Exam and legal knowledge in their programs, 

will be allowed to enter.

Item 6 relates to the time of the exam. It has been determined that the Legal Professions Entrance Exam will be held twice a year in April and September; and the Administrative Jurisdiction Preliminary Exam will be held once a year in september by Student Selection and Placement Center (SSPC) in accordance with the protocol. 

The exam is in the form of a test and will consist of at least one hundred multiple-choice questions. The topics that are responsible for the exam and the corresponding scores are listed below.

-Constitutional Law, 6 points,

-Constitutional Jurisdiction, 2 points,

-Administrative Law, 6 points,

-Administrative Procedure, 4 points,

-Civil Law, 12 points,

-Law of Obligations, 10 points,

-Commercial Law, 10 points,

-Civil Jurisdiction Procedure, 8 points,

-Enforcement And Bankruptcy Law, 6 points,

-Criminal Law, 8 points,

-Criminal Procedure, 6 points,

-Labour Law, 6 points,

-Tax Law, 4 points,

-Tax Procedure Law, 2 points,

-Attorney Law, 4 points,

-Legal Philosophy and Sociology, 4 points,

-History of Turkish Law, 2 points,

In the Administrative Jurisdiction Preliminary Exam;

-Constitutional Law, 8 points,

-Constitutional Jurisdiction, 2 points,

-Administrative Law, 10 points,

-Turkish Administrative Organization, 6 points,

-Administrative procedure, 8 points,

-Civil Law, 8 points,

-Law of Obligations (General Provisions), 8 points,

-Commercial Business and Company Law, 4 points,

-Civil Jurisdiction Procedure, 6 points,

-Criminal Law (General Provisions), 4 points,

-Criminal Procedure, 4 points,

-Tax Law, 10 points,

-Tax Procedure Law, 4 points,

-Finance and Economy, 10 points,

-Zoning and Environmental Law, 4 points,

-Philosophy and Sociology of Law, 4 points,

Those who score seventy points out of one hundred for the Legal Professions Entrance Exam and the Administrative Judicial Preliminary Exam will be considered successful. It is also regulated in the regulation that people who are found to have taken the exams even though they do not meet the required conditions will be deemed invalid regardless of the time elapsed, even if they get enough points.

The Regulation will enter into force on 08.05.2024, the date of its publication.

 

It has been reported that the Proposal for the Law Amending the Turkish Commercial Code and Some Laws in the tax circular dated 06.05.2024 and numbered 2024/49 prepared by the Revenue Administration has been submitted to the Turkish Grand National Assembly. The draft law in question was submitted to the Parliament on 03.05.2024. In the proposal of the law, it is envisaged to make some amendments to the Turkish Commercial Code No. 6102.

With the Presidential Decree No. 7887 published in the Official Gazette dated 25.11.2023 and numbered 32380, the minimum capital amounts of joint stock and limited liability companies are as follows;

-50,000 TL to 250,000 TL for joint stock companies,

-From 100,000 TL to 500,000 TL for non-public joint stock companies that have accepted the registered capital system

-Increased from 10,000 TL to 50,000 TL for limited companies.

However, no capital increase is required for existing companies whose capital is below the updated amounts. With the proposal of the law, it is foreseen that joint stock and limited companies that were registered in the trade registry before 01.01.2024 and whose capital is below the new minimum capital amount will automatically disappear if they cannot be adjusted and adjusted to the new capital amounts until 31.12.2026.

Joint stock and limited liability companies whose capital is at least below the capital amount will be required to increase their capital to the new capital amounts by 31/12/2026. Companies that do not provide this adaptation will be deemed dissolved and will be required to initiate the liquidation process stipulated in the Law and ensure the cancellation of the trade registry record.

Non-public joint stock companies that have accepted the registered capital system will be required to adapt their initial capital and issued capital until 31/12/2026. However, an additional measure is foreseen in the regulation in order to avoid uncertainties and grievances about adaptation in these companies. For example, a company that has adopted the registered capital system with an initial capital of 300,000 Turkish Liras and an issued capital of 1,000,000 Turkish Liras will not face dissolution since its initial capital is less than 500,000 Turkish Liras, and if the companies in this and similar situations do not provide adaptation, they will be deemed to have left the registered capital system as long as their issued capital is 250,000 Turkish Liras and above. Non-public joint stock companies that have accepted the registered capital system with a issued capital of at least 250,000 Turkish Liras shall be deemed to have left this system if they do not increase their initial capital and issued capital to 500,000 Turkish Liras by the aforementioned date. 

In the general assemblies to be held in order to increase the capital to the amounts stipulated in Articles 332 and 580, the meeting quorum shall not be sought, the decisions shall be taken with the majority of the votes present at the meeting and no concession shall be used against these decisions. 

The adjustment period determined as 31.12.2026 by the Ministry of Commerce may be extended a maximum of twice for one year.

With the same law proposal, the obligation of the board of directors and the deputy chairman to be determined every year has been eliminated. It is stipulated that the board of directors should be excluded from the scope of their inalienable duties and powers regarding the appointment and dismissal of persons other than the senior executives of the company, and that the chairman of the board of directors should be obliged to call the board of directors to a meeting in the meeting requests made by the board of directors.

The above-mentioned are at the stage of drafting and have not entered into force.

 

The subject of his individual application to the Constitutional Court with application number 2022/66987 and decision date 21.12.2023; is the allegation that the freedom of expression has been violated due to the failure to deliver the books to the detainees or convicts in prison institutions.

In the concrete case, the applicants are detained or convicted of terrorist crimes in certain penitentiary institutions. The applicants were informed that some books received by mail could not be delivered in accordance with the decisions taken by the Training Boards of the Penitentiary Institution. There is no prohibition of sale, confiscation or confiscation order issued by the courts for the books that are not delivered to the applicants.

In the decision made by the Education Boards of the Penitentiary Institution, it was reported that the relevant publications included statements that propagated terrorist organizations, insulting and humiliating statements about public institutions, and articles, news and comments aimed at wearing out the state elders and the institutions working for the security of the country. They added, however, that there were sketches of institutions of execution and quotations from publications in which crimes were praised, strikes announced, and banned publications. After the findings, it was presented as a reason that would prevent the realization of the objectives of the security of the institutions and the rehabilitation of the prisoner. 

Thereupon, the applicants first complained to the execution courts against the decision, but these were rejected. Against the objections, the objection to the heavy criminal courts was rejected on similar grounds. Finally, the applicants made an individual application to the Constitutional Court.

Article 62 of the Law No. 5275 on the Execution of Penalties and Security Measures, titled "The right to benefit from periodicals and indefinite publications", states that "(1) The convict has the right to benefit from periodicals and indefinite publications by paying the price, provided that they are not prohibited by the courts. (2)Newspapers, books and printed publications issued by foundations and associations working in the public interest, which are granted tax exemption by the Council of Ministers, provided that they are not prohibited by official institutions, universities, professional organizations in the nature of public institutions and courts, are given free of charge and freely to convicts. Textbooks of convicts who continue their education and training cannot be subject to supervision. (3) Any publication that endangers the security of the institution or includes obscene news, articles, photos and comments shall not be given to the convict. "  

In its assessment of the allegation that the freedom of expression was violated, the Constitutional Court stated that in its previous decisions, it considers the acceptance of the periodicals or indefinite publications brought by the visitors to the convicts and detainees via cargo or purchased by the convicts and detainees to the penitentiary institution within the scope of freedom of expression.

Article 26 of the Constitution states that "Everyone has the right to express and disseminate his/her thoughts and opinions alone or collectively through words, texts, pictures or other means. This freedom includes the freedom to receive or give news or ideas without the intervention of official authorities. "

The Court found that it was not manifestly ill-founded and that there was no other reason to rule on its inadmissibility, which led to the admissibility of the applicants' allegations that there had been a violation of freedom of expression. It was determined that evaluations that did not meet the criteria stipulated by the Constitutional Court were made in the decisions of the administrations of the Penitentiary Institution and the courts of degree regarding the inability to deliver the said publications to the applicants. In the aforementioned decisions, it was stated that the parts that were objectionable were not specified in the relevant publications, and that these parts were evaluated with concrete evaluations instead of concrete connections.

With its decision, the Constitutional Court decided to accept the claim that the freedom of expression guaranteed in Article 26 of the Constitution was violated, to send the decision to the courts of first instance for retrial and to pay moral compensation to the applicants.

 

In 2021, the Competition Board conducted an investigation about META Platforms Inc. regarding the data collected from Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp services and the suspicion of abuse of dominant position regulated in Article 6 of the Law No. 4054 on the Protection of Competition. As a result of the investigation, as a result of the investigation, the Competition Board imposed an administrative fine of 4,796,152.96 TL on the gross revenues of 2022 for each day until Meta fulfilled these obligations, starting from 12 December 2023. 

Subsequently, upon the provisional measure decision of the Competition Board to prevent data consolidation behavior, Threads announced to its users that it would be temporarily closed in Turkey. 

Upon the developments described above, the Competition Board imposed a fine of 335,730,707.20 Turkish Liras on Threads, Meta's social media platform, which was closed in Turkey on 07.05.2024.

In its decision, the Competition Board stated that a provisional measure decision was taken to prevent the data consolidation behavior of Meta, which has a comprehensive and detailed data accumulation, and that the obligations in the provisional measure decision remained irrelevant with the decision to impose a daily administrative fine of 4,796,152.96 Turkish Liras for each day until this decision was fulfilled, and then Meta closed Threads, which was its application without finding a solution proposal. The daily administrative fine has been terminated for being irrelevant. The Authority imposed a total fine of 335,730,707.20 Turkish Liras for the seventy days beginning on 20.02.2024 and ending on 29.04.2024.

23.1.2019 dated resolution of the board of directors attested by 4th Notary Public of Istanbul Criminal Court of Peace dated 05.04.2023 with different business number 2023/1812 is related to the administrative fine imposed by the Istanbul Traffic Inspection Branch Directorate. In the decision in question, to which the Istanbul Provincial Security Directorate was a counterparty, the administrative fine was objected to. Although it has been requested from the relevant institution to clarify the determination made by the honorary traffic inspector, it has been observed that no evidence has been reported by the institution issuing the penalty report that the act constituting the objectionable misdemeanor has been carried out.

In the event that individuals have a legal basis in return for their actions that constitute a crime and misdemeanor, imprisonment, judicial fine, administrative fine and other sanctions are applied as sanctions. For the implementation of these sanctions, the actions of individuals must be fixed and proven.

As a matter of fact, the Constitutional Court stated this issue in its individual application numbered 2014/139, based on 2014/52 regarding the implementation of the Highway Traffic Law, as follows: "In accordance with the basic rules of the Constitution and criminal law, one of the conditions sought for the punishment of persons is that the unlawful act is specified in the law and the other is that this act was carried out by that person."

As a result of all these reasons explained, Istanbul 4th Criminal Court of Peace has decided to abolish the administrative fine since even the evidence showing the contrary of the issues in the objection petition that the action subject to the traffic fine decision report of the objector has not been submitted by the administration.

 

Article 12, paragraph 5 of the Personal Data Protection Law No. 6698 states that "In the event that the processed personal data is obtained by others through illegal means, the data controller shall notify this situation to the relevant person and the Board as soon as possible. If necessary, the Board may announce this situation on its own website or by any other method it deems appropriate. "

In summary, in the data breach notification submitted to the Board by Alexion Pharmaceutical Trade Limited Company, which has the title of data controller includes the information down below:

-The violation occurred between 13.02.2024 – 21.02.2024,

-A cyber attack was carried out on the systems of the data processing company from which the data controller company receives services for clinical trials,

-It has been determined that the data kept on the sFTP server of the data processor has been leaked out by unauthorized person(s),

-The groups of persons affected by the violation are responsible researchers (SMM), research center staff, people assigned to the research study and clinical research participants/volunteers (subjects),

-A total of 607 people, 150 of whom were clinical trial participants/volunteers, were affected by the violation,

-Personal data affected by the violation;

-For participants/volunteers participating in the clinical trial (all “pseudonym (pseudonymized/coded)”); participant ID (key code identifier), study name, status, explicit consent date, screen failure date, random date, arm/cohort/startification, first dose date, current dose date, last dose date, last visit date, number of rescan, previous participant ID, age, gender, race, ethnicity, randomized end of period, reason for treatment discontinuation, date of treatment discontinuation, reason for study discontinuation, date of study discontinuation, completed study, date of study completion, date of death, SDVTier, participant ID, year of birth, laboratory results, value within range (with in range), laboratory date, drugs used, medical history information,

-For responsible researchers, research center personnel, persons assigned for the research study; field personnel information, UserOID, login name, screen name, full name, user role, country, corporate contact information (address, e-mail, fax, telephone, license number)

It has been stated that the investigations regarding the violation announced on the website of the Personal Data Protection Board are ongoing. In the breach, it was pointed out that the pharmaceutical company had obtained important data on the health history of the affected persons.