HomeExtradition Between the UAE and Turkey
The United Arab Emirates and Turkey can extradite people to one another. What was once a complex process based on vague reciprocity is now governed by a direct bilateral agreement signed in July 2023. This new treaty reflects the deepening diplomatic and economic ties between the two nations, and it changes everything.
This article breaks down the new legal landscape. We’ll cover the step-by-step process, the specific grounds for refusal, and the critical role of international bodies like INTERPOL. For anyone facing an extradition request, understanding these rules is the first step in building a defense.
What is the Legal Basis for Extradition Between Turkey and the UAE?
At the heart of it all is the bilateral extradition agreement signed between the governments of Turkey and the United Arab Emirates in July 2023. This treaty replaces older, more ad-hoc arrangements with a formal, standardized procedure for surrendering individuals for prosecution or to serve a sentence. It was submitted for ratification and, as is standard, comes into full legal effect 30 days after both countries complete their internal legal procedures and notify each other. This short timeline means that any lingering cases under the old, less predictable rules will quickly be replaced by this new, clearer framework.
Several key principles from this agreement and its supporting laws define the entire process:
- Dual Criminality: This is the foundation of extradition. The act in question must be a crime in both the UAE and Turkey, punishable by at least one year in prison. If it’s illegal in one country but legal in the other? No extradition.
- Minimum Sentence: You can’t be extradited to serve a trivial amount of time. For people who have already been convicted, the agreement requires a minimum sentence remaining—often six months—before a request can even be made.
- Multilateral Conventions: Where the bilateral treaty is silent, both nations fall back on broader international agreements they’ve signed. This includes the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and the UN Convention against Corruption, which fill in any gaps on judicial cooperation.
- Domestic Law: The treaty creates the international obligation, but local law executes it. In the UAE, Federal Law No. 39 of 2006 on International Judicial Cooperation in Criminal Matters is the playbook the Public Prosecution and courts use to process and rule on an extradition request.
| Criterion | UAE | Turkey |
|---|---|---|
| Governing law | Federal Law No. 39 of 2006 | 2023 bilateral treaty; domestic extradition law |
| Key judicial body | Court of Appeal, Ministry of Justice | Turkish courts, Ministry of Justice |
| Min. penalty threshold | Imprisonment of at least 1 year | Imprisonment of at least 1 year |
| Bilateral treaty | Signed July 2023 | |
How Does the Extradition Process Work in Practice?
Extradition is not a quick transfer. It’s a formal, multi-stage process involving diplomatic channels, courtrooms, and government ministries.
- The Formal Request — one country submits a formal extradition request to the other through diplomatic channels: an arrest warrant or judgment, a statement of facts, evidence, and the text of the relevant laws.
- Provisional Arrest — in urgent cases, a country can request a provisional arrest before the full paperwork is ready, usually triggered by an INTERPOL Red Notice. If arrested in the UAE on this basis, authorities can hold the person for up to 40 days — a narrow window for the requesting state to file its formal case, and for the detained individual’s legal team to begin preparing a defense.
- Judicial Review — once the UAE Ministry of Justice deems the request complete, the Public Prosecution files a case with the Court of Appeal. The court doesn’t decide guilt or innocence — it checks whether dual criminality is met, whether documentation is correct, and whether any absolute bar to extradition applies. The individual has the right to a lawyer and to contest the request in court.
- Final Executive Decision — a green light from the Court of Appeal isn’t the end. The file goes to the Minister of Justice, who has the final say, weighing humanitarian concerns and foreign policy considerations before signing the surrender order.
What Are the Grounds for Refusing an Extradition Request?
Even with a treaty in place, extradition is never automatic. Both international law and the UAE-Turkey agreement provide mandatory and discretionary reasons for refusal.
Political Offenses
Extradition is almost universally denied if the offense is political. This exception protects people from prosecution over their beliefs, though it’s narrow — it won’t cover terrorism, attacks on heads of state, or serious crimes with a political motive attached. The recent warming of relations between President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government and the UAE has likely reduced the kind of political friction that might have influenced such cases in the past.
Risk of Torture or Inhuman Treatment
Under international law, this is an absolute bar. Both the UAE and Turkey are signatories to the UN Convention against Torture (CAT). Article 3 forbids sending a person to a country where there are substantial grounds to believe they would face torture. Cases before the European Court of Human Rights, such as Mamatkulov and Askarov v. Turkey, show how closely courts scrutinize this risk.
Nationality
Many civil law countries refuse to extradite their own citizens. The UAE has been flexible on this in some treaties, so it remains a possible ground for refusal — though not a free pass, since a state that refuses often becomes obligated to prosecute the person domestically instead.
Double Jeopardy (Ne bis in idem)
A person can’t be extradited if they’ve already been tried for the same crime in the requested state.
Other Standard Refusals
A request may also be denied if the offense is purely military, if the statute of limitations has expired in either country, or if the request is shown to be a pretext for persecuting someone based on race, religion, or nationality.
What Are Some Notable Cases or Contexts?
You can’t understand the UAE-Turkey extradition relationship without the political backstory best illustrated by Sedat Peker.
Peker, a notorious figure in Turkish organized crime, was living in the UAE. In 2021, he began releasing YouTube videos with explosive allegations of corruption against senior Turkish officials close to President Erdoğan, including Süleyman Soylu and Berat Albayrak. His presence in the UAE was a major point of friction before the 2023 treaty. As diplomatic and economic ties began to mend, his freedom to operate was squeezed, and he went largely silent.
Between late 2025 and early 2026, Peker gradually reappeared in public life — primarily through charitable donations rather than further political allegations, breaking roughly four years of silence in December 2025. In August 2026, he posted publicly about plans to “return,” reigniting speculation about his legal status. Nothing here confirms an active extradition proceeding, but the episode remains the clearest real-world illustration of how political relations between the two governments can shape — or stall — cooperation on criminal matters, and exactly why the 2023 treaty was meant to move such decisions from backroom politics into a structured legal process.
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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Are the UAE and Turkey allies?
They have become close strategic partners after years of regional rivalry. The relationship has warmed significantly, leading to deeper diplomatic, economic, and security cooperation — cemented by formal agreements like the 2023 extradition treaty, which signals a high degree of mutual trust.
Is the UAE-Turkey extradition treaty in force yet?
The treaty was signed in July 2023 and submitted for ratification. As with most bilateral treaties, it takes full legal effect once both countries complete their internal ratification procedures and formally notify each other. Until then, cooperation can still occur through INTERPOL channels and broader multilateral conventions both countries have signed.
Can a Turkish national be extradited from the UAE?
Yes, in principle — nationality alone is not an automatic bar under this treaty, though it can be raised as a ground for refusal depending on the circumstances. Each case is assessed individually against the dual criminality requirement and the treaty’s specific exceptions.
What happens during the 40-day provisional arrest window?
Once someone is provisionally arrested — typically on the basis of an INTERPOL alert — the requesting state has up to 40 days to submit a complete, formal extradition file. If it fails to do so in time, the person is generally entitled to release. This window is also the critical period for the detained person’s lawyer to begin building a defense.
How does the Sedat Peker case illustrate how the treaty works?
Peker’s case shows how political relations between two governments can directly affect extradition outcomes — his situation in the UAE shifted as diplomatic ties between Ankara and Abu Dhabi improved, well before any court proceeding took place. The 2023 treaty was designed precisely to replace that kind of informal, politically-driven process with a structured legal one.
