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A tele­phone inter­view with Aslı Erdoğan pub­lished today, May 16th 2019, on Yeni Özgür Poli­ti­ka.

Ini­ti­at­ed by Ley­la Güven, appeals have mul­ti­plied for hunger strikes denounc­ing the extreme iso­la­tion of Kur­dish leader Abdul­lah Öcalan. Writer Asli Erdo­gan also express­es the need for the strik­ers’ demands to be met as quick­ly as pos­si­ble and calls on  con­science expressed through pub­lic opin­ion. She under­scores the fact that her friend Zozan Ciçek, her co-detainee in jail also on hunger strike, has now trans­formed it into a fast­ing until death [with no absorp­tion of for­ti­fiers of any kind]. Aslı Erdoğan salutes all the prisoners.

Here is her message:

Never has there been such a terrifying period

The fact that 7 000 peo­ple are on hunger strike is unprece­dent­ed. This can lead to extreme­ly grave and seri­ous con­se­quences. My for­mer cell­mate [Bakırköy prison – Istan­bul] is present­ly fast­ing to the death. Such a young friend. For this rea­son, my reac­tion to these hunger strikes and death fast­ings is even more emo­tion­al. See­ing what is hap­pen­ing, and espe­cial­ly the silence around it, is even more painful. While I was incar­cer­at­ed, con­di­tions were ter­ri­ble, yet a bit bet­ter. I can well appre­ci­ate the per­se­cu­tions to which are sub­ject­ed the ones on hunger strike or death fasts.

The absence of Rights in Turkey has reached a lev­el that inspires ter­ror. Nev­er has there been such a peri­od, even under times of coups d’E­tat. Peo­ple are sen­tenced to hor­rif­ic prison terms, such as 30 years, in the absence of all proof,  with indict­ments devoid of any legal sub­stance, based on “secret tes­ti­monies”. I know of sev­er­al such cas­es, or of oth­ers I read about. At any rate, the jails will reach the point of explod­ing… When I see the head­lines, I’m afraid we will wit­ness events even more trag­ic still.”

 Conscience is completely dead in Turkey

The strik­ers’ demand is legit­i­mate, per­fect­ly jus­ti­fied legal­ly, human­ly and polit­i­cal­ly. This demand which calls on the State to respect its own laws, pur­sues an objec­tive valid for every­one. More­over, it is an easy demand to sat­is­fy. The fact this receives no oth­er answer than absolute silence is very ter­ri­fy­ing. This shows that the State no longer has any­thing to do with democ­ra­cy, with the Law, with con­science and with human­i­ty. That is what is the most fright­en­ing aspect of it.

Photos by Zeynep Kuray

In Turkey, con­science is total­ly anni­hi­lat­ed. The State start­ed this killing and it has spread to the whole soci­ety. The fact that moth­ers are molest­ed, the treat­ment to which they are sub­ject­ed, is par­tic­u­lar proof that all moral codes have been trans­gressed in Turkey. There is no more respect for the dead. No more respect for the moth­ers, for those who are right. In oth­er words, there is no more respect for human life. This soci­ety, this coun­try, can now do what­ev­er it wants. In a coun­try that has lost its con­science, any­thing can happen.

Hon­est­ly, I don’t under­stand why the var­i­ous milieux, such as that of the intel­lec­tu­als do not see what is going on and keep silent. I sup­pose the tabu on Öcalan’s name fright­ens them and that they tell them­selves “I won’t get mixed up in this busi­ness”. To what extent do they allow them­selves to for­get that Öcalan is enti­tled to his human and con­sti­tu­tion­al rights, as any oth­er human being? Or are they only pre­oc­cu­pied by the ille­gal­i­ty of elec­tions? I don’t know. But, in the end, this silence will kill us all.

This silence must stop as quick­ly as pos­si­ble and eyes must turn toward the pris­ons. I don’t expect pub­lic opin­ion to sup­port the hunger strikes. Still, if 7 000 peo­ple have stopped eat­ing and move step by step, day by day, clos­er to death, we have to ask our­selves: “What can we do?” No mat­ter what your polit­i­cal opin­ion may be, you can­not remain indif­fer­ent faced by this polit­i­cal tragedy. The moth­ers, chil­dren, fathers, sis­ters and broth­ers, the rel­a­tives of 7 000 peo­ple are in the streets, attempt­ing to make their voic­es heard. I call on pub­lic opin­ion to be alive to this problems.

Zozan Çiçek grèves de la faim turquie

Zozan Çiçek

Not one bite goes down my throat

What is hap­pen­ing in Turk­ish pris­ons must be relayed in Euro­pean news. We have reached a point where we can no longer speak of a pub­lic opin­ion with­in the coun­try. There is no more free press, there is no Law. As a min­i­mum, Euro­pean pub­lic opin­ion must pay atten­tion to what is hap­pen­ing in Turk­ish pris­ons. What is more, I do not under­stand the silence of Euro­pean coun­tries. This sit­u­a­tion can­not be con­sid­ered as an inter­nal prob­lem in Turkey.Pub­lic opin­ion some­times responds to cer­tain names, but pre­tends not to see the hun­dreds of thou­sands of peo­ple in jail. There are tens of thou­sands of ille­gal­ly incar­cer­at­ed pris­on­ers. From Europe, not a sound. There has­n’t been any reac­tion for a long time. The fact all this has reached such a point takes its source in the silence of Europe.

The blade is now on the bone. The hunger strikes con­sti­tute such a cry. They mean “we can no longer man­age to live under these con­di­tions”. Before reach­ing such a point, much could have been done to keep Turkey with­in the con­fines of the Law. But that was not done and still isn’t.

Through Zozan, I salute all my friends. If I were to say “I am sad­dened”, that would be demor­al­iz­ing. But I can’t help think­ing of them. Not a sin­gle bite  goes down my throat. I repeat again: their demand could eas­i­ly be answered, and this answer would be good for every­one in Turkey.

Their demand is legit­i­mate, polit­i­cal­ly, legal­ly and humanly.”

 HDP elect­ed deputy for Hakkari Ley­la Güven began a hunger strike on Novem­ber 8 2018 dur­ing her incar­cer­a­tion, ini­ti­at­ing a large wave of sup­port among thou­sands of polit­i­cal pris­on­ers and out­side activists who joined her strug­gle. As under­scored by Asli Erdo­gan, there are now 7 000 strik­ers inside the jails. On April 15, fif­teen of them raised their action into a fast unto death, by no longer absorb­ing any for­ti­fiers. On May 10, their num­ber had reached 30.

As for Stras­burg 14 men and women have been on hunger strike since the 151st day.

There is prob­a­bly no need to add that today, the 190th day of hunger strike for Ley­la Güven, the con­di­tions of the strik­ers is extreme­ly critical.

Here is the address in order to sup­port Zozan, the friend men­tioned by Aslı Erdoğan, by send­ing her let­ters and cards:

Zozan Çiçek
Bakırköy Kadın Kapalı Ceza­e­vi
Zuhu­rat­ba­ba Mah.Lepra Has­tane­si Yanı
34158 Bakırköy/İSTANBUL TURKEY


JUST IN ON MAY 16:

On the 190th day of the hunger strike ini­ti­at­ed by Deputy Ley­la Güven, the Turk­ish Min­istry of Jus­tice has just announced the lift­ing of the iso­la­tion measures. 

The restric­tive mea­sures rel­a­tives to vis­its by Öcalan’s lawyers have been lift­ed”, the Turk­ish Min­is­ter of Jus­tice Abdul­hamit Gül announced at a press con­fer­ence today.

Turk­ish pro-gov­ern­men­tal media com­ment this dec­la­ra­tion as fol­low­ing a vis­it by the Euro­pean Com­mit­tee for the Pre­ven­tion of Tor­ture (CPT) con­duct­ed on May 7th on the island-prison of Imrali where are detained the Kur­dish leader Abdul­lah Öcalan and three oth­er Kur­dish polit­i­cal pris­on­ers, and the recent vis­it of two lawyers.

For his part, Newroz Uysal, one of Öcalan’s lawyers, announced that on April 22nd, they had received a noti­fi­ca­tion con­cern­ing the pro­hi­bi­tion of inter­views. “For this rea­son, the only inter­view we were able to have (on May 2nd) was con­sid­ered  an ordi­nary one… Although there was no longer any ques­tion of a pro­hi­bi­tion, inter­views were stopped nonethe­less. The fact the Min­is­ter him­self has made this dec­la­ra­tion today is impor­tant for us, as per­tains to the strik­ers’ demands.”

More info on ANF English


Translation by Renée Lucie Bourges

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