Asrın Law Bureau lawyers applied to Bursa Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office and İmralı Penitentiary Institution Administration on Tuesday to meet their client Abdullah Öcalan, the jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), Mezopotamya News Agency reported.
Lawyers say they received neither a positive nor negative response to twice- weekly applications to meet with Öcalan, who has been imprisoned on İmralı island in western Turkey since 1999.
Although a visit ban on Öcalan’s family ended in November 2021, lawyers said that the judicial authorities have not responded to the family’s applications to meet Öcalan.
Rezan Sarıca and Nevroz Uysal, Öcalan’s lawyers, last met with their clients in May, June and August of 2019, after 8 years. Since then, lawyers have not been allowed to meet with their clients.
After Öcalan’s legal representatives at the Asrın Law Office recently appealed to Europe’s Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) for an immediate visit to İmralı Prison, CPT announced that they visited Öcalan between 20 and 29 September 2022.
However, the CPT delegation failed to make clear whether they met the PKK leader in person during that visit. The uncertainty has fuelled concerns over Öcalan’s health and conditions, escalating both in Turkey and abroad demonstrations calling for an end to his isolation.