During the ‘Political Prisoners: Isolation, ill-treatment and torture’ conference in the European Parliament on Thursday, many attendees highlighted the detention conditions of political prisoners in Turkey and Europe, in particular the isolation of Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Öcalan.
Repression of political prisoners
The first keynote speaker on Thursday, Edre Olalia, of the International Association of Democratic Lawyers, highlighted the situation in his native Philippines:
“All [political prisoners] are subjected to torture, and have suffered unjust, indefinite detention on multiple forced charges… Political prisoners at the main detention centre face the threat of transfer to solitary isolation cells…. The state is cruel to political prisoners.”
Later, the first panel of the day addressed the repression of political prisoners in Catalonia and the Basque Country. Aurora D’Agostino discussed the detention of Italian anti-fascist political prisoners in Italy.
There is a pan-European crisis of human rights, Louis Lemkow said at the panel discussion, spotlighting abuses from Turkey to Catalonia to Hungary.
A focus on Turkey and Öcalan
The second keynote speaker, Dr. Gülşah Kurt addressed the situation in Turkey itself, and the detention of Abdullah Öcalan. She spotlighted the Kurdish leader’s detention and the broader suspension of the rule of law, saying:
“The Mandela rules, which specifically govern prison conditions are internationally accepted as the minimum standard… They indicate that under no circumstances may detention conditions amount to… cruel or degrading punishment. Regarding the condition of prisoners, human dignity is a fundamental principle. This is where the exception to the rule comes in… One has to ask if international safeguards for prisoners aren’t respected, is there any point in implementing these standards?”
Deepa Driver of the Haldane Society introduced a panel specifically focused on the crisis in Turkey and the detention of Öcalan. She noted that in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) statistics, only the USA has a worse incarceration rate than Turkey:
Lena Charlotta Lagnander, who joined a delegation to İmralı to try and assess the maltreatment of Öcalan, shared findings from their visit. She described women who were scared to approach Kurdish organisations for help, for fear of state repression: “It’s dangerous to be a woman in any country; to be a Kurdish woman in Turkey is very, very dangerous.”
“This isolation method started with Mr. Öcalan when he was arrested and taken to İmralı; it’s now in all of Turkish society, and other countries in Europe. This is why it’s so important to talk about what’s going on in Turkey, but it’s not only a Turkish issue,” said Lagnander:
She continued: “The isolation method is used in different ways. In prison, you are not allowed to talk in Kurdish, or to your fellow prisoners. The treatment of prisoners is very bad. When you are released, you get a bill for the food you’re eating! If you can’t pay, you have to stay in prison.”
The final conclusion of a European Parliament conference on political prisoners stated that the European Union and Council of Europe must take “concrete steps to end the inhumane practices in Turkish prison conditions… and the Imrali Island Prison, which has become a primary [site] of isolation [as] torture”.
