Turkish Cypriot publisher and writer Sener Levent, editor-in-chief of newspaper Avrupa, has filed a lawsuit against Turkey at the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) for alleged violation of his freedom of expression, it emerged on Tuesday.

According to the Cyprus News Agency, Levent’s lawyer Onjell Polili argued that Turkey violated Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights and that his client was ‘judicially harassed’ by Ankara for the repeated criminal cases opened against him.

ECHR’s Article 10 states that “everyone has the right to freedom of expression.

“This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers,” he said.

There are currently a total of seven criminal cases pending against Levent in Turkish Cypriot ‘courts’ and another three in Turkish courts, according to an article that appeared on Avrupa.

The article also claimed that the ultimate goal of all cases against Levent is to silence him.