As legal privilege attaches by virtue of the profession being exercised, so long as the confidential information is possessed by an attorney, its disclosure by the attorney cannot be requested. There should not therefore be any difference as to whether the information concerns a civil or a criminal trial, or a regulatory or an investigatory situation.

However, the following limitations have recently been imposed on legal privilege concerning clients charged with certain serious and/or terrorism related offenses:

• Under article 6 of Law No. 6749 and the Law on Criminal Execution No. 5275, officials may be present and seize any documents exchanged during meetings between an attorney and a suspect who has been detained on suspicion of crimes endangering the State's security and organized and/or terrorism related crimes, where there is sufficient information and/or evidence demonstrating the possibility of any of the following:
  • A threat to the public and/or members of penal institutions
  • Guidance to or orders relating to terror or criminal organizations being given
  • The conveyance of confidential messages relating to terror or criminal organizations
• Under article 3(i) of Law No. 6755, in the case of crimes endangering the State's security or organized and/or terrorism offenses, an attorney's offices may be searched by the police and documents may be seized upon an order of the public prosecutor.
• Under Law No. 7672, which regulates the "Prevention of Financing the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction", self-employed lawyers are under an obligation to report suspicious transactions in relation to the sale and purchase of immovable properties; the establishment, liquidation, management and acquisition of companies, foundations and associations; banks, moveable assets and any types of accounts, and the administration of the assets in these accounts. A joint declaration was issued by 71 bar associations in Turkey regarding this regulation, stating that it ignores the right to defense and is incompatible with the nature of attorneyship, and an action for nullity is pending before the Constitutional Court.

Notes of interviews with employees and other documents produced during investigations should be covered by legal privilege to the extent that such notes are in the attorney's possession.