Jurists call on CPT to disclose the situation in Imrali

Human rights activists in the city of al-Tabqa and the Euphrates region held the greatest responsibility for human rights organizations. Regarding the unknown situation of the leader Abdullah Ocalan and its silence on the Turkish occupation state's violation of the laws and international agreements it signed.

10 January, 2023 03:00

NEWS DESK, NIHAD KARAO, SALAM KIRAWAN

The Turkish occupation state continues to tighten the isolation of the leader Ocalan and prevents his lawyer and his family from visiting him, and imposes the most severe penalties on him in Imrali, despite the submission of periodic requests to visit him by his relatives and lawyers, which are always rejected.

In this regard, human rights activist Moataz al-Sudan from al-Tabqa city said, "The international conspiracy against the leader Ocalan is entering its 24th year, which led to his extradition to the Turkish occupation state, which tried him in a mock trial, in which his rights were violated."

Sudan indicated, "Human rights charters consider absolute isolation of a prisoner as systematic torture against humanity, and the countries that have signed the United Nations Convention against Torture (and Turkey is one of them) have pledged not to subject anyone to torture or cruel treatment, and to take all legislative and administrative procedures and measures." and judicial prohibition of torture”, but Turkey is not committed to that.

He continued, "The Imrali prison is a black hole, in which new sentences are issued that are not subject to legal oversight, and the commander's lawyers do not even have access to legal files. Rather, what is called disciplinary penalties and a ban on meeting detainees are imposed, and (CPT) announced that it visited Imrali prison in September 2022, but she did not make any statement about the leader’s health.”

Turkey violates the right of leader Ocalan

In turn, the administrator of the Office of Social Justice in al-Tabqa, the human rights activist, Muhammad al-Shuaiti, said: "The isolation of the leader Ocalan is a heinous act and a violation of human rights," adding, "Every prisoner has a human right that should not be denied, and the Turkish occupation state violates this right of the leader Ocalan and prevents him from his simplest rights.

"Isolation is illegal and illegal work, and this arrest has nothing to do with the law," he said.

At the end of his speech, al-Shuaiti held, "the greatest responsibility of the human rights authorities for their silence on the Turkish occupation state's violation of the international laws and agreements it signed."

The health status of leader Ocalan is still unknown

For her part, the human rights activist and the co-chair of the Social Justice Council in the Euphrates region, Roshan Hajim, warned of the unknown health status of the leader Ocalan in light of the conditions of Imrali Island in which he is being detained and the disciplinary penalties imposed by the Turkish authorities on him, and she said: "The dampness in the cell in which he is detained poses a danger on his life, in light of his deprivation of practicing sports or sunbathing, and thus the Turkish occupation state does not respect the laws and agreements it signed, specifically the Convention against Torture.

According to Article 1 of the Convention against Torture, any act that willfully inflicts severe pain or suffering on a person, whether mental or physical; It is held accountable by the member states of the agreement.

And Article /11/ of the Convention requires each country to remain under review regarding the rules and instructions of interrogation, by detaining and treating persons who are subjected to any form of arrest or detention in its prisons; With the aim of preventing cases of torture inside the prisons of those countries, and all of this while the leader is still in isolation in his prison with the existence of this agreement and its laws.

Roshen referred to the suspicious role of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) towards the leader, "although it can pressure the authorities of the Turkish occupation state to reveal the status of the leader, and allow him to meet his clients and his family, and it has the right to enter any detainee without restriction from any authority."

At the end of her speech, she called on "CPT to disclose its report on its last visit to Imrali prison in September 2022, to clarify its ambiguous position regarding the leader and the isolation imposed on him, to stand by its laws and to oblige member states to respect them."