The first ses­sion of Nuriye and Semih’s tri­al was held today, Sep­tem­ber 14, in Ankara. The two who were fired from their teach­ing posi­tions have been on hunger strike since March 9 2017. They were tak­en into cus­tody on May 22 and jailed on May 23rd.

The Court took only one deci­sion — in their absence : that of main­tain­ing them in prison. The next ses­sion will be on Sep­tem­ber 28, in the cour­t­house locat­ed on the cam­pus of Sin­can prison in Ankara.

Here are a few details…

Nuriye and Semih were not brought before the judges. The Ankara Secu­ri­ty Direc­torate informed the court in writ­ing and plead­ed for their absence “due to a lack of suf­fi­cient per­son­nel, the risk of provo­ca­tions and the risk of escape.” Of note : On the 190th day of a hunger strike car­ried out beyond all crit­i­cal phys­i­o­log­i­cal lim­its, Nuriye and Semih are cer­tain­ly no longer autonomous, nor can they walk or even talk.

Also worth not­ing : fol­low­ing their incar­cer­a­tion, Nuriye and Semih were hos­pi­tal­ized in June due to their fail­ing health. Their lawyers had peti­tioned the Con­sti­tu­tion­al Court for their imme­di­ate release. The Court turned down the request : “No emer­gency affect­ing their phys­i­cal and men­tal exis­tence requires an imme­di­ate intervention.”

Nuriye and Semih face a sen­tence of 20 years for “mem­ber­ship in an armed ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tion”, “pro­pa­gan­da for a ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tion” and “infrac­tions to the law on demon­stra­tions and assemblies”.

The brief of indict­ment spec­i­fies that the demon­stra­tions and actions by the accused were ordered by “the ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tion” and there­fore can­not be con­sid­ered as actions seek­ing redress of their rights and adds : “Con­sid­er­ing the fact they chant­ed slo­gans linked to the ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tion, their active resis­tance to the secu­ri­ty forces dur­ing their arrests, it appears clear­ly that the actions were done at the behest of the ter­ror­ist orga­ni­za­tion DHKP‑C and that the sus­pects are active in the DHKP‑C.”

Fol­low­ing this state­ment by the pros­e­cu­tor, the lawyers had appealed to the Euro­pean Human Rights Tri­bunal this time, in an extreme­ly detailed report of 33 pages and 77 para­graphs. The deci­sion was ren­dered in August : it was also a refusal moti­vat­ed by the fact that “their arrest does not rep­re­sent a vital dan­ger”. Nuriye and Semih were invit­ed to put an end to their hunger strike.

Despite pro­hi­bi­tions and bar­rages, a crowd had massed in front the Jus­tice Palace today. Civ­il soci­ety orga­ni­za­tions, men and women polit­i­cal fig­ures, union rep­re­sen­satives, intel­lec­tu­als and artists… Semih’s com­pan­ion, Esra Öza­kça, who is also on a hunger strike, was on the premises.

Pri­or to the ses­sion, sup­port groups were barred from hold­ing a press con­fer­ence, as were the lawyers who had come to the cour­t­house for Nuriye and Semih’s defense.

Also note­wor­thy : On Sep­tem­ber 12, Nuriye Gül­men and Semih Özakça’s lawyer Acun Karadağ’s was tak­en into cus­tody dur­ing a wide­spread oper­a­tion. Fol­low­ing this vio­la­tion of the right to a defense, the Pres­i­dents of the Bars of sev­er­al towns such as Ankara, Antalya, Adana, Van, Sakarya etc.. came before the court to act as defense lawyers. This was unprece­dent­ed in the his­to­ry of mobi­liza­tions with­in the Turk­ish Bar.

See­ing that the lawyers were tak­en into cus­tody on Sep­tem­ber 12, Acun Karadağ request­ed a sup­ple­men­tary delay to pre­pare the defense.
Me Murat Yıl­maz : “Not pre­sent­ing Nuriye and Semih to their own tri­al is a demon­stra­tion of fear.” Refer­ring to the lack of evi­dence in the file, he added that Nuriye and Semih did not need to defend them­selves and request­ed their acquit­tal and imme­di­ate release.

We request three min­utes to speak about our 18 col­leagues who were tak­en into cus­tody. Sev­er­al lawyers were kicked, myself includ­ed.” “1130 jurists asked to be present at this hear­ing. We want­ed to hold a press con­fer­ence with over 100 lawyers.”

Murat Timur, Pres­i­dent of the Van Bar spec­i­fied that sev­er­al unfair dis­missals were ordered by decree. “Nuriye and Semih have become the spir­it of all those who have suf­fered these injus­tices. We are here for a rea­son. Do not lose your con­science. You have a great duty, for the per­sons on whom you are pass­ing judg­ment are head­ing toward death, step by step.”

Veli Küçük Pres­i­dent of the Adana Bar, said that “tol­er­ance to diverse voic­es is a rich­ness”, and added “My clients are tar­get­ed because they are resist­ing a cul­ture of enslavement.”

Zafer Kazan, Pres­i­dent of the Bar in Sakarya and Polat Balkan of the Bar in Antalya also plead­ed for the pris­on­ers’ acquit­tal. Polat Balkan : “We must re-awake the con­science of jus­tice in pub­lic opinion.”

But we will not for­get the way in which the police repressed the crowd of demon­stra­tors, as usu­al, and man­han­dled a cer­tain num­ber (today at 13h30).

Seen here : a pho­to tak­en by phone and draw­ings by Tarık Tol­u­nay that have cir­cu­lat­ed on social media.


En français “Ce devait être la pre­mière audi­ence pour Nuriye et Semih…” Cliquez pour lire

Traductions & rédaction par Kedistan. Vous pouvez utiliser, partager les articles et les traductions de Kedistan en précisant la source et en ajoutant un lien afin de respecter le travail des auteur(e)s et traductrices/teurs. Merci.
Kedistan’ın tüm yayınlarını, yazar ve çevirmenlerin emeğine saygı göstererek, kaynak ve link vererek paylaşabilirisiniz. Teşekkürler.
Kerema xwe dema hun nivîsên Kedistanê parve dikin, ji bo rêzgirtina maf û keda nivîskar û wergêr, lînk û navê malperê wek çavkanî diyar bikin. Spas.
Translation & writing by Kedistan. You may use and share Kedistan’s articles and translations, specifying the source and adding a link in order to respect the writer(s) and translator(s) work. Thank you.
KEDISTAN on EmailKEDISTAN on FacebookKEDISTAN on TwitterKEDISTAN on Youtube
KEDISTAN
Le petit mag­a­zine qui ne se laisse pas caress­er dans le sens du poil.