Turkish police arrest a Kurdish boy during a demonsration in main Kurdish city Diyarbakir on December 31, 2011 as they protest aginst a Turkish air raid.

In 2010 the Turkish Parliament, reacting to criticism by Amnesty International and other human rights organizations, modified their Anti-Terrorism Laws to end the prosecution of children in adult courts solely for taking part in demonstrations. Despite this change, children, and particularly Kurdish children, continued to be arrested, prosecuted, jailed and abused under other provisions in the Turkish Anti-Terrorism laws.

What has taken place at Pozanti prison outside of Adana, Turkey, reveals just how badly children are being abused and mistreated under these laws. According to a report by members of the European Parliament, children in the prison were deprived of food and medical treatment, beaten while naked with iron bars by prison staff, and sexually abused by adult prisoners. As H.D. a 15-year-old, reported:

“Some of our friends were molested many times. They beat us and forced us to undress. What we have been through cannot be put into words.”

The abuses were reported to the Ministry of Justice, but only seven months later, after the abuses were publicized by a Kurdish news agency and on twitter, did the Justice Minister take action.  His solution: move the children from Pozanti to another overcrowded children’s prison 500 kilometers away from their families and put them in single, camera-monitored cells.  As for the three Kurdish reporters who published the story about the abuses, they were arrested a few days ago and charged with being members of a terrorist organization.

April 23 was Children’s Day in Turkey. The Turkish NGO Followers of Justice for Children (ÇİAT) organized a forum in honor of the occasion. At it, a child victim of Turkey’s Anti-Terrorism Laws “who doesn’t prefer to tell his name speaks: ‘We didn’t kill anybody, we didn’t damage to property of anyone. Why are we kept in prison while people selling drugs are walking outside? Nothing happens to the drug-dealers. However, we are put in prison. We are beaten. We do not want to be put in prison any more.’”

When the reporter asked why “he didn’t prefer to tell his name, he reminded [the reporter of] the child who was subjected to 40 years of penalty as he talked to press after he was released from Pozantı Prison.”

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“We came here for our students under arrest. This is not their place, they should be at their classrooms.”

According to BIANET, the independent human rights news organization that reported on the faculty lectures, some 600 high school and university students are currently under arrest.  Their offenses vary: a number of students were arrested for selling concert tickets; some for demanding free education; some for taking part in demonstrations; one for carrying a sign that declared “Women are not slaves of men nor power”.  This particular student was found not guilty of “being a member to a terrorist organization”; however she and five other students were found guilty of making “propaganda of a terrorist organization”.

Sounds incredible?  Not when you take into account Turkey’s loosely written anti-terrorism laws, under which people expressing opinions that coincide with the opinions of “terrorist groups” are routinely sent to prison.

Almost six years ago, Amnesty International issued a major report on the flaws and potential for abuse of Turkey’s anti-terrorism laws, and campaigned against their being instituted.  As can be seen from the cases cited above, little has changed since the report was issued.  Nor has the quashing of free expression by students been limited to the Turkish justice system.  The Turkish minister of Education recently reported to the Turkish Parliament that in 2010 and 2011 a total of 7,043 college students have been subjected to disciplinary investigations at their colleges. 4,602 of them have received suspensions while 55 have been expelled.   If you are a student in Turkey, it probably would be wise to keep to yourself any political or social opinions you might have.

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A Turkish woman with fake bruises stands with protesters holding placard reading ''end violence'' during a demonstration to protest against rape, killings and domestic violence against women, in Ankara last year. ADEM ALTAN/AFP/Getty Images)

International women’s day in Turkey began with the murder of a woman seeking shelter from family violence in a medical center. It ended in Ankara with the Turkish Parliament passing a bill “to protect the family and to prevent violence against women.”

The long-overdue bill was badly needed.  “What do we have in Turkey?” a representative of one of Turkey’s leading women’s rights groups asks in Today’s Zaman.  “Violence against women, exploitation of female labor and bodies, female poverty, female unemployment, child brides and girls who are not sent to school.”

This assessment is supported by equally bleak statistics: According to the Turkish police, 78,488 incidents of domestic violence were registered in the 19 months between February 2010 and August 2011 — an average of one incident of domestic violence every ten minutes. Since this number includes only officially reported incidents, it is likely that the actual number was far higher.

Yet, despite the fact that 42% of Turkish women report having experienced violence, usually from a husband or family member, there are only 84 women’s shelter with a total capacity of 1879 women , said the Minister of Environment and Urbanism during the debate over the bill.

Whether this move by the Turkish government will significantly improve Turkey’s depressing record on protecting women from violence remains an open question.  Initial reports do not indicate that the quality and number of women’s shelters will increase to meet the needs of the country’s battered and threatened women any time in the near future.  Still, it is a step forward.  Let us hope that there will be a significant reduction in the number of incidents such as the one that initiated International Women’s Day in Istanbul.

In 2011 Turkey imprisoned 104 journalists, causing Reporters Without Borders to drop Turkey’s press freedom ranking to 148^th in the world.  Either the country has one of the most vicious and corrupt press corps in modern history or these arrests are politically motivated.  However, the Prime Minister will have none of this.  When American Ambassador to Turkey Francis Ricciardone stated that he was unable to understand the massive arrests, he was dismissed by Erdogan as a “rookie ambassador” who just didn’t understand Turkey.

Erdogan’s increasingly surreal rhetoric concerning jailed journalists is probably due to the growing negative reporting on freedom of the press in Turkey. What has received far less attention, however, is the equally worrisome current practice of imprisoning attorneys in Turkey who attempt to defend journalists and others caught in the massive wave of arrests currently underway in Turkey.

Agence France Press reported in November that scores of Kurdish lawyers were arrested in a police crackdown throughout Turkey; those arrested in various crackdowns during November included 42 lawyers of convicted PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan.  Arresting lawyers because of their clients’ misdeeds is a violation of Principle 18 of the UN Basic Principles on the role of lawyers:

“Lawyers shall not be identified with their clients or their clients’ causes as a result of discharging their functions.”

It is also a convenient way to stifle dissent.  In Shakespeare’s Henry the Sixth, part 2, a character says “the first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.”  Apparently, the Turkish government has found an alternative they believe to be equally effective.

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Hrant Dink was shot dead outside his Istanbul office in 2007. © Private

Five years ago, Hrant was gunned down in front of his Istanbul office by a 17-year-old Turk named Ogun Samast.   Dink, an outspoken member of Turkey’s dwindling Armenian community and the editor of the newspaper, Agos, had long been subject to public vilification and state harassment.  His death was a shock, but it was no surprise.

Samast was convicted last year of the killing, and sentenced to over 22 years.  It was obvious, however, that the teenager was not acting alone: not only had Samast himself confessed he was driven by a group of people whom he called “older brothers;” In 2010 the European Court of Human Rights ruled that the Turkish authorities had “failed to act on information they received that could have prevented Dink’s murder and had failed to investigate the role of state officials in his death.”

Despite this judgment, however, on January 17 a Turkish court convicted only one individual, Yasin Hayal of instigating the 2007 murder, rejecting “claims that the murder was an act of conspiracy by an illegal network within the Turkish state.”   Yet there is good reason to believe that elements of the security services were involved, particularly because Hayal had close relations with officers in the local gendarmerie.

This was, as Reporters Without Borders has stated, “a sham trial”. Amnesty International’s Turkey Researcher Andrew Gardner notes:

The security services knew of the murder plot and were in communication with those accused of the murder yet nothing was done to stop it taking place. Nothing short of a full investigation into the actions of all the state institutions and officials implicated in the murder will represent justice.

Currently, Turkey is imprisoning thousands for what appear to be political crimes.  Among these journalists like Nedim Şener, a forceful critic of Turkey’s handling of the Dink case.  The irony is that while journalists like Şener languish in pre-trial detention, the real conspirators – and murderers – continue to garner their government pay.

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© MUSTAFA OZER/AFP/Getty Images

On December 3rd, demonstrations were held in Istanbul and 40 provinces of Turkey, protesting lengthy pre-trial detentions, mass custodies and arrests, and called for the abolishment of Turkey’s draconian anti-terrorist law. In Istanbul alone, some 2000 persons, including the Deputy Chair of the CHP, Turkey’s main opposition party, engineers, architects and doctors joined in the demonstration.

As we noted in a previous blog, thousands of Turkish citizens have been imprisoned and await trials—some for over two years–under this law. Those arrested and imprisoned have even included lawyers defending others who were incarcerated.

In its most recent Annual Human Rights Report, Amnesty International again underlined the violations of freedom of speech carried out under the anti-terrorism law.

The anti-terrorism laws, carrying higher prison sentences and resulting in pre-trial detention orders, were used to stifle legitimate free expression. Kurdish political activists, journalists and human rights defenders were among those most frequently prosecuted.

On December 1st, Turkish president Abdullah Gul, in a response to questions submitted by internet users, said “[t]he lengthy detentions are becoming a punishment and I’m really disturbed. The trials must be accelerated. The crimes of those people, if any, must be determined as soon as possible, or else they must be set free.” We can only hope President Gul’s statement will soon be translated into action by the Turkish government. Meanwhile, large numbers of Turkish lawyers, human rights defenders, politicians, academics, writers and publishers continue to remain locked up, victims of an anti-terrorism law desperately in need of repeal.

Ragip Zarakolu

Years ago, Tom Lehrer sang “when correctly viewed, everything is lewd.”  In today’s Turkey, one might well sing “when correctly viewed, everyone’s a terrorist.”  How else do you explain the recent incarceration of Ragip Zarakolu, currently being held in a prison designed for hardened and dangerous criminals?

Zarakolu, 65-year-old and in ill health, is a book publisher and human rights activist who has been accused of terrorism– apparently because he gave a talk at a legal Kurdish political party’s Politics Academy.  Professor Büşra Ersanlı was also detained and records of their interrogation by prosecutors show that both Zarakolu and Ersanlı were asked about their participation with the Politics Academy.

As of now, both Ragip Zarakolu and Professor Ersanli can only speculate about what the evidence against them is, but both know they are being charged under Turkey’s flawed Anti-Terrorism legislation where the definition of terrorism is overly broad, vague and lacks the level of legal certainty required by international human rights law. Fundamentally, it defines terrorism by its political aims rather than its tactics.

Provisions criminalizing membership of a terrorist organization have also led to abuses. Persons can be found guilty of membership of a terrorist organization without being a member of the organization if found to have committed a crime ‘in the name of such an organization’.

Zarakolu most likely won’t hear the evidence against him until his trial.  Meanwhile, this ailing 65 year-old publisher must spend a year or more  in a prison reserved for “dangerous convicts and criminals.”

As detailed in a previous blog, Ragip Zarakolu and Ersanlı were  arrested and remanded to prison for their alleged connections to Kurdish nationalist groups.   Others awaiting trial under Turkish anti-terrorism legislation are being charged with being part of an organization called “Ergenekon,” which is accused of plotting to overthrow the Turkish government.  Over time, the Ergenekon trials have seemed to be as much about settling political scores as protecting democratic institutions.

Recently, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the leader of the Turkish Parliament’s main opposition party, went to another Turkish prison to visit two of his party’s elected deputies–Mustafa Balbay and Mehmet Haberal—both being held in pre-trial detention for allegedly participating in the Ergenekon plot.  Afterwards, the party leader angrily stated,

“In countries where there is no logic and wisdom, where there is no developing concept of democracy and freedom, those who speak out about their opinions are being held in concentration camps.”

Kılıçdaroğlu is not, of course, a neutral commentator.  Still, the elected deputies he visited in prison have spent years behind bars, and still haven’t had a chance to defend themselves in a court of law.  Perhaps “concentration camp” is not just hyperbolic political rhetoric after all.

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Turkish women protesting on International Women's Day in Ankara on March 8, 2011. (ADEM ALTAN/AFP/Getty Images)

Despite the activism of women’s groups in Turkey, violence against women has dramatically increased since Turkey’s Justice and Development Party gained power almost a decade ago.

The murder of women has increased by 1,400 percent between 2002 and 2009. The latest official figures indicate that during the first six months of 2011 alone more than 26,000 women in Turkey reported family violence cases, including domestic violence, honor killings, sexual assaults and incest.

Yet despite this appalling statistical evidence, Turkish authorities have not seriously addressed the problem.  Prime Minister Erdogan has commented that women should have at least three children and openly announced that he does not believe in gender equality. Subsequently, Prime Minister Erdogan replaced the Ministry for Women and Family with a Ministry of Family and Social Policies despite concerns by Turkish women’s rights groups and international organizations that such change could divert much needed efforts to promote the rights of women.

Over the past decade, Turkey has witnessed major legislative reform on women’s rights and is signatory to the new European Convention to Prevent and Combat Violence Against Women. Turkish signatures to such conventions are meaningless, however, unless followed by actions.

Turkey desperately needs more women’s shelters, and it needs a better-trained police force.  Women activists have noted that if a woman seeks police protection from domestic violence, law enforcement officers who place preserving patriarchal familial structure and family unity over her individual safety often hand the woman back to abusers.

Above all, if Turkey is to reverse the frightening rise in violence against women, leadership has to come from its ruling party. As Turkish women’s activist Melek Özman has pointed out:

“If we can have the prime minister, who uses such strong rhetoric, saying with full conviction, ‘Whoever slaps a woman, carries out violence against women, will face the state; the state is against this,’ it would be a major step in resolving this crisis.”

Iraqi Kurds hold up torches as they protest to denounce Turkey's latest bombing campaign on Kurdish separatist bases in northern Iraq. (Shawn Mohammed/AFP/Getty Images)

In the early afternoon of August 21, 2011 Hussain Mostafa Hassan, a 61-year-old Kurdish farmer from the village of Bolle near Mount Qandil on the Iraq-Iran border, was heading to the town of Rania, accompanied by six members of his family, when the car he was driving was bombed, reportedly by a warplane belonging to the Turkish armed forces.

Hussain Mostafa Hassan, his 43-year-old wife, Mer Haci Mam Kak, his daughter Rezan Hussain Mostafa, aged 20, together with her two daughters Sonia Shamal Hassan, aged two, and Sholin Shamel Hassan, aged six months, his son Zana Hussain Mostafa, aged 11, and his niece Oskar Khuzer Hassan, aged 10, all died as a result. Later their burnt bodies were taken to a hospital in Rania and buried the same day.

The Turkish Kurdish separatist group the PKK, which has been labeled a terrorist organization by both the EU and the U.S., had killed 40 Turkish security force members in previous days, and the Turkish military was bombing them in retaliation.  On August 24^th, the Iraqi government formally protested the seven civilian deaths and demanded an immediate halt to the air strikes along its northern border.

Amnesty International called on the Turkish authorities to open a prompt, thorough and independent investigation into the incident. Two days later, the Turkish military responded that not only were no civilians targeted, but, according to the Turkish Foreign Ministry, the pictures showing the dead civilians “were made up for PKK propaganda.”

Despite the Turkish military’s denials, Amnesty International stands by its call for a thorough investigation.  Seven innocent people were blown apart during Turkey’s incursion into Iraq; someone has to be held responsible for this violation of humanitarian law.

A number of vulnerable families in the Tarlabaşı district have already been evicted © Jonathan Lewis

Another resident, an unemployed 60-year-old man with a lung condition, told Amnesty International that he had been forced to sign eviction notices that he was not allowed to read.

According to Andrew Gardner, Amnesty International’s researcher on Turkey,

“Most of those facing eviction have not been given adequate notice. They have not been consulted, provided with legal remedies, or offered adequate alternative housing or compensation. This is a violation of their human rights. There must also be an investigation into the allegations of harassment by public officials.”

Other families threatened with eviction include some of Turkey’s most vulnerable populations: Roma, Kurds who settled in the Tarlabaşı district of Beyoğlu after being displaced from south-eastern Turkey in the 1990s, and transgender women, who, as documented in a recent Amnesty report already face considerable prejudice in accessing housing.

Under international law, evictions may be carried out only as a last resort, once all feasible alternatives have been explored in genuine consultation with the affected communities.

To ensure that the Beyoğlu authorities live up to their obligations under international law, write the following officials, asking them to suspend all forced evictions immediately and not to proceed until safeguards consistent with international human rights standards are in place, including a genuine consultation with the residents facing eviction, and that no evictions are carried out without adequate notice and remedies:

Mayor of Beyoğlu
Ahmet Misbah Demircan
Beyoğlu Belediyesi
Şişhane Meydanı
Beyoğlu
Istanbul – Turkey
Fax: +90 212 252 1100
Email: baskan@beyoglu.bel.tr
Salutation: Dear Mr Demircan

Minister of Interior
İdris Naim Şahin İçişleri Bakanı
T.C. İçişleri Bakanlığı,
Bakanlıklar
Ankara  – Turkey
Fax: +90 312 418 1795
Email: ozelkalem@icisleri.gov.tr
Salutation: Dear Minister