A creditor with a money claim against a debtor in Türkiye can ask a Turkish court to attach the debtor’s assets before the claim is decided, and in some cases before any proceedings have begun. The decision is a precautionary attachment (ihtiyati haciz) under Articles 257 to 265 of the Enforcement and Bankruptcy Law (İİK). For a foreign creditor it is a tool; for a foreign debtor whose goods or receivables in Türkiye have been attached, it is a document to be understood within days. The court that gives it is the one competent under Article 50 (Article 258(1)), and Article 260 lists its contents in five numbered items.
Money claims only
Under Article 257(1), the measure is open to a creditor owed a money debt that is due and not secured by a pledge; a debt not yet due qualifies only in the situations the Article lists. That is the boundary with the interim injunction (ihtiyati tedbir) of the Code of Civil Procedure, which can protect the subject of almost any dispute (HMK Article 389). Keeping “precautionary attachment” for one and “interim injunction” for the other lets a reader tell from the name which statute, conditions and time limits apply.
Whether the debtor was heard
The court is free to hear both sides or not (Article 258(2)). The heading gives the court and the file number, and the decision may record that it was given without hearing the debtor. That wording is kept exactly, because the debtor’s route and time limit for objecting depend on it (Article 265(1)).
Items 1 and 2: parties, documents and amount
Item 1 names the creditor, any representative and the debtor, with their domiciles. The İİK is written in an older Turkish, and a decision may echo words such as mümessil for representative; the English version gives the meaning without imitating the archaic register. Item 2 states the documents on which the attachment rests and the amount of the claim. A cheque, an invoice, a contract or a bono is named as such, with bono explained as a promissory note at its first mention. The amount and the currency are copied without conversion, together with the date and number of the underlying document where the decision gives them.
Items 3 and 4: ground and assets
Item 3 gives the ground for the attachment, usually by reference to Article 257, and the reference stays as written. Item 4 states what is to be attached. Some decisions list specific assets; others use general wording. The translation follows whichever form the decision uses, and it neither turns general wording into a list nor condenses a list into general wording.
Item 5: liability and security
Item 5 records that the creditor is liable to compensate the damage the attachment may cause and states what security was given. As a rule the creditor provides security; none is required where the claim rests on a court judgment, and for a document having the force of a judgment the court decides (Article 259). Type and amount of security are copied exactly. If no security was taken, the reason given in the decision is translated too, so that the reader can see why the line is empty.
Periods counted in days
The interim injunction runs on weeks; the precautionary attachment runs on days. The decision lapses by itself if the creditor does not ask for it to be carried out within ten days of the date it was given (Article 261(1)). The officer who carries it out draws up a record showing the assets attached and their value, and the enforcement office serves a copy within three days on those not present (Article 262). Where the attachment came before any proceedings, the creditor starts enforcement or sues within seven days (Article 264(1)), and once the conditions are met the attachment becomes an attachment in execution by operation of law. A debtor who was not heard objects within seven days (Article 265(1)). Ten days remain ten days in English, and none of these periods is expressed in weeks.
A rejection, and electronic copies
If the request is refused, the refusal is reasoned and open to istinaf (Article 258(3)); the document then translated is a refusal, and its English title says so. For enforcement documents signed with a secure electronic signature, the rules on sealing and multiple copies do not apply (Article 8/a), so a missing seal on a UYAP print-out is not marked as a defect. Acte Tercüme translates precautionary attachment decisions, attachment records and the documents they rely on between Turkish and English.