Call for women to write to female prisoners
To Js
Dear All,
It was said in the last official announcement made by the Ministery of Justice in November 2016 that there were 179.000 prisoners in 370 jails in Turkey, 7894 and 4704 of whom being women and foreigners, respectively (the number of foreign prisoners were 23 in various jails in Turkey in 2009).
This number has increased incrementally during the period of OHAL (state of emergency) which was taken as an opportunity to silence opponents from all fractions beyond judging actors of the coup, following the coup attemp in July 2016. Jurisdiction’s getting under Erdoğan’s control almost entirely and acting politically in jurisdiction without minding law have pulled the number of arrests up to unbelievable levels.
Today 21 people are staying in rooms for eight; three are sharing the same bunk in jails.
Erdoğan who imprisoned all political opponents though there were no rational evidence, accorded the right of being transferred to open prisons and parole to offenders of hate murder, women murder, etc. by way of statutory decree no. 671 that he issued to make room at the prisons (initially 38000, in total 100000 prisoners are going to benefit from this statutory decree).
Erdoğan’s last statutory decree no. 693 has given the government the right to build prisons in public forestry lands. Minister of Justice Bekir Bozdağ announced that 175 new prisons are going to be built in 2017.
Number of women like writers, journalists, painters, academicians, lawyers, non-governmental organization representatives, human rights defenders, union members, students, mps, etc. in prisons have almost doubled. Most of these women who are or taken as opponents are being tried with aggravated life imprisonment; are kept as prisoners without their bills of indictment were prepared. They are forced to live a scary uncertainty.
A group of woman activists in Turkey have made a world-wide call to all women to write letters to impr,soned women in Turkey.
You can learn about this call, text of which is below and detailed information about this campaign by contacting these activists and Ms. Melek Özman (melekufuk@gmail.com) who is the director of FilmMor which is one of the two Women’s film festivals in Turkey.
Please share this call with all women in your contact lists.
Best regards
ps. In May 30, 2017, Bergül Varan who is the sister of Betül Varan, one of the vocalists of Grup Yorum which is one of the leftist music groups, members of which are frequently arrested and concerts of which are cancelled, and was taken into custody during a police raid at Idil Cultural Center in Istanbul, was tortured by her hair being torn out from their roots as it is seen in the photograph, in the action force vehicle where she was kept for two hours.
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Mehmet Atak
+ 90 212 225 54 41
+ 90 212 343 50 04
Write Letters to our Friends in Prison!
We, the women activists in Turkey, make a call to the international society to stand in solidarity with our friends in prison. Support us in our joint action by writing open letters to them.
In our letters, we are sharing our memories, stories, thoughts, and wishes about our friends who are detained or arrested, or convicted… They are women rights activists, politicians, journalists, authors, and lawyers… We marched together at every protest with our friends in prison. We organized conferences, panel discussions, festivals. We were side by side when we went to the funerals of femicide victims, when we paid our condolences to their families.
We went together to the court hearings of abused and raped women, of women who defended themselves from the aggressors. Our friends wrote our petitions against violence and discrimination and took them to Parliament. They represented us. They demanded the municipalities to open day-care centres for children, to build safe houses for domestic abuse victims, to create equal job opportunities.
Together, we made a vow to fight for women’s freedom!
Together, we defended our rights!
The efforts of those who put our friends behind iron bars are in vain… There is no wall to separate us from each other. There is no turning back, now that we have come this far. And we will write our memories, stories, thoughts, and wishes so that they will forever be remembered. We will meet again and laugh together. We will share a better future.
Let’s write about our friends, let’s write to our friends, in any medium, printed or digital, on our social media accounts. Only a few sentences or full of pages. And please send your letters to arkadasimayaziyorum@gmail.com so that we can collect them
The Fight of Women Can Not Be Judged Initiative
@kdnlryrglnyr / kadinlaryargilaniyor@gmail.com
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