The Kurdistan National Congress (KNK) has issued an urgent call on the Council of Europe (CoE), the European Union (EU), and the United Nations (UN) to organise an ad hoc mission to Turkey’s İmralı Island Prison, where the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Öcalan has been held since 1999.
In the event that a visit is not immediately feasible, the KNK further urged the said institutions to exert legal, political, and diplomatic pressure on Turkey, a member state, to allow the lawyers or family of Öcalan to visit him without delay.
The call comes amidst growing concerns over Öcalan after Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK) Executive Council Member Sabri Ok disclosed on Friday distressing details concerning threatening letters sent to him in İmralı Island Prison in the past.
One such letter stated, “We will administer a poison that will lead to your demise. Even the insects that feed on your corpse will be poisoned and perish,” according to Ok.
The KNK also recalled an incident from 2007 when hair samples from Öcalan revealed significantly elevated levels of poisonous chromium and strontium, confirmed by various international laboratories, including the ChemTox laboratory in Strasbourg.
The Congress asserted that the resurfacing of these past incidents, coupled with Öcalan’s prevailing incommunicado state in İmralı Prison, have raised great concerns about the PKK leader’s health and safety among the Kurdish people.
