Bilateral:

Albania, Algeria, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Belarus, China, Croatia, Georgia, Iran, Iraq, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Lithuania, Macedonia, Moldova, Mongolia, Northern Cyprus, Oman, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan

No. As per Article 54 of International Private and Procedural Law No. 5718 ("IPPL"), reciprocity must exist between Turkey and the country in which the foreign judgment/award was delivered. Reciprocity may be contractual, actual or legal. In other words, Turkey and the country in which the foreign award was delivered may have executed a bilateral agreement regarding the enforcement of court decisions; Turkey and the country in question may not have an agreement but there is a de facto reciprocity between them or Turkey and the country in question may have legislation regarding the enforcement of decisions.

In the case of undisputed claims, an application to enforce a foreign court decision is usually concluded between 6 months to 1 year.

If there are disputed claims, an application to enforce a foreign judgment is usually concluded between 1.5 to 2 years at the court of first instance. In the event of an appeal, the appeal stage is usually concluded within a period of 1 to 2 years.

The filing of the lawsuit for the enforcement of foreign monetary judgments is subject to the payment of the court fee equal to 1.7% of the value of the judgment. The court fee for the enforcement of non-monetary foreign judgments, however, is approximately USD 25 as a fixed fee. The claimant has to make an advance payment to the court's cashier for the legal costs and expenses such as service of court papers, expert examination, etc. in the amount of USD 500-1,000.

Regardless of being opposed, the enforcement claims require the same costs above.

A decision subject to enforcement must be “conclusive and final” in terms of the laws of the country where the decision was rendered. In other words, there should be no more legal remedies available for such a decision. In practice, Turkish courts require the submission of a finalization statement of the relevant foreign court stating that the decision has become final. However, some foreign legal systems do not have such practice and do not issue any finalization statements. In such cases, even though it is not a strict legal requirement, Turkish courts do not enforce the decision unless the requesting party can submit such a finalization statement. This is partly due to judges not being fully aware of procedures regarding the enforcement of court judgments.

The foreign judgment must not relate to a subject falling under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Turkish courts (e.g. lawsuits related to real estates located in Turkey) and must not have been rendered through the exercise of exorbitant.

Also, the foreign judgment should not explicitly violate Turkish public policy. The examination of the violation of the public policy includes an examination of whether the implementation of the foreign judgment in Turkey gives rise to any contradiction of public policy. Defendants in enforcement suits often invoke the violation of public policy as a ground for questioning the merits of the foreign judgment. However, as the courts are barred from going into the merits of a dispute in enforcement suits (prohibition of revision au fond), such objections are only rarely addressed in commercial enforcement suits.