Days after Turkey's election authority rejected a request to annul the referendum on boosting the president's powers, the country's main opposition party on Friday took its petition to the nation's highest administrative court.
The Republican People's Party's (CHP) lawyer Atilla Kart formally lodged the petition with the Council of State on Friday afternoon, telling reporters the move was not "just for the 'No' voters" but for the protection of all voters' legal rights.
Kart added there were also 'No' voters among the unstamped ballot envelopes the YSK allowed, describing the situation as "complete lawlessness".
He said the CHP was evaluating whether one of the ways to challenge the vote included applying to the Constitutional Court or the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).
An unprecedented the High Electoral Board (YSK) decision to accept as valid ballots that didn't bear the official stamp has led to outrage. The opposition party is contesting the results of Sunday's referendum due to a number of voting irregularities, in particular an electoral board decision to accept ballots without official stamps, contrary to Turkish law.
Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım responded by saying it was "not the democratic way to go to court, to make complaints to fix the people's decision".
Speaking to reporters in Ankara, he described such efforts as "futile" and said there was "no point in wasting more of everyone's time".
International monitors, including a team from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, have also noted irregularities in the voting that resulted in a narrow win for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's "yes" camp.
