HIGHLIGHTING THE TURKISH DEATH FAST

CAMPAIGING: Ruairi O'Driscoll, Sinan Ersay and Alex Mc Crory who are hoping to raise awareness about the plight of the turkish prisoners.

Andersonstown News, 13th August 2001
Story by: Alison O’Brien

The brother of a Turkish death faster has demanded that the Turkish government meet the demands of hunger strikers.

Sinan Ersay’s brother was moved to one of the contentious F-type prisons two weeks ago. He has been in prison for three years since being sentenced to 15 years, and has been on death fast since the hunger strike started ten months ago.

“Their demands have to be met. They are prepared to die for us and our message to the government is prevent it,” said Sinan.

Sinan has been campaigning with Ruairí O’Driscoll from the London-based Committee for Struggle Against Torture Through Isolation, to force the hand of the Turkish government on the issue.

Sinan’s brother is on what is called support hunger strike which means he is on hunger strike for forty days and then off for ten days to look after the other death fasters. This is his fifth time on the support hunger strike. Prisoners rarely get to see their families and even lawyers visits are restricted.

“We met lawyers when we were in Istanbul and when we spoke to them it was four or five weeks since they were last allowed in. It seems that the authorities can stop their visits or suspend their rights whenever they see fit,” said Alec McCrory of the Ballymurphy ex-prisoner Association.

After the attack on the prisons in December of last year only about 1,200 prisoners were actually transferred to the F-type prisons and the rest were taken to dungeon like prisons which were full of water.

“If there was a person in an Irish jail the solicitor could apply for a writ of habeas corpus which means the state has to produce the prisoner to satisfy the court the prisoner isn’t being abused,” said Alec. However, Ruairi explained that in Turkey no such law exists.

“There are some clauses in the constitution that say that every citizen has the right to life, the right to protest. The lawyers of the prisoners tried to use the constitution to highlight the atrocities with little success.” Ruairi called on the obvious parallel between Turkish prisons and Long Kesh.

“Long Kesh was a prison with modern facilities but that was not why it was introduced. It was introduced to isolate prisoners from each other to destroy their collective,” said Ruairi.

Over the last week, however there have been two major developments in Turkey. The doctors who performed the autopsies on the bodies after the massacre in December have released a report which totally contradicts the Turkish State’s version of what happened in the prisons.

“The state had claimed that prisoners had shot themselves at close quarters with their own guns but these people have established that the prisoners where shot with high velocity rifles at various distances,” said Alec.

In a system which deliberately abuses the rights of prisoners the virtual disappearance of prisoners is not unknown. “When the prisoners were transferred to F-type prisons it took weeks and sometimes months to establish were prisoners were. Prisoners would virtually disappear. This was the case with Sinan’s brother, no-one knew where he was for a week,” said Ruairi.

“Since the resistance started the state has used tactics to undermine them. Initially they said there wasn’t a hunger strike. There have been the lies, the massacres and the force feeding. But they haven’t managed to stop the resistance.”

Support groups in west Belfast continue to picket and protest. “Things are starting to move in Belfast and various organisations throughout the six counties,” said Alec. “Given that Dublin takes over Presidency of the EU next month this would put it in a crucial position.”

A delegation from the west Belfast Turkish Hunger Strikers Committee will meet with Jim Dougal, Head of Representation of the European Commission on Tuesday. “I am happy to meet with Alec so he can give his views and I will pass them on to the Commission,” said Mr Dougal.

Ruairí made a final appeal for international observers to come forward.

“How many have to die. The priority is to try and conclude this as quickly as possible.”