Literary debate events, dubbed ‘Dialogue Days’, underway globally between 15 and 22 June, promote the work of Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader held in unlawfully prolonged isolation on the Turkish high-security prison island of İmralı, call for his release, and advocate a peaceful resolution of the decades-long Turkish-Kurdish conflict.
In a call for worldwide participation, the organisers of ‘Dialogue Days’ aim to foster public discourse around Öcalan’s theories on feminism, ecology and democratic confederalism, which have shaped the Kurdish movement in Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran, and influenced international action against oppression, most famously coining the slogan ‘Jin, Jîyan, Azadî’ (Woman, Life, Freedom). Campaigners stress that “You can’t imprison ideas!”
A potential 74 events are expected to run across continents, including panel discussions, seminars and participatory debate, for the public to explore core themes addressed in Öcalan’s writings. Keep updated as events unfold, with our live blog launching on 18 June.
Organisers, who lead a wider campaign under the banner ‘Freedom for Abdullah Öcalan, a political solution to the Kurdish issue’ call for the Kurdish leader’s release from isolation as a pathway to renewed peace talks between the armed PKK movement and the Turkish government.
The wave of literary campaign events coincides with a new call direct from the campaign organisers, for international institutions, including the Council of Europe, to address Öcalan’s detention conditions, deemed a ‘legal black hole’ by his team of lawyers.
“The current conditions of Öcalan’s imprisonment violate human rights conventions and anti-torture agreements as recognised by the Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Degrading Treatment (CPT), European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), the United Nations Human Rights Committee (UNHRC) and other institutions,” campaigners stated.
“We therefore urge the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, CPT, Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, Committee of Ministers, UN Human Rights Committee, and relevant institutions to oppose Öcalan’s illegal and inhumane isolation,” they continued.
The above, they stressed, must demand Turkey permit Öcalan visits from family and lawyers, since he has been in total incommunicado for the last 38 consecutive months of his solitary confinement, in which he has been held since 1999.
Setting out a roadmap, campaigners said “an ad-hoc committee within PACE [Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe] should be formed to address the severe international legal violations against Abdullah Öcalan, which amount to torture.”
The CPT should then ensure the implementation of its recommendations, overseen by the Legal Affairs Committee, and highlight any
unaddressed recommendations over the past 24 years, the campaigners said, referring to the release of prison inspection reports barred by Turkey.
Furthermore, direct intervention was urged to prevent the “reintroduction of the death penalty” against Öcalan, imprisoned under an aggravated life sentence. He must be allowed to “play a role in finding a just and
democratic political solution to Turkey’s decades-old Kurdish conflict,” the campaigners reiterated.
