Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) İzmir Deputy Murat Çepni, who visited the families of the prisoners held in İzmir prisons, shared his obversations with our agency. 

 

Stating that families are worried about the lack of necessary precautions and hygiene in prisons during the pandemic, Çepni said: "We have repeatedly stated that prisons are risky areas during the pandemic, Human Rights Association (İHD), Medical Chambers and our party. The government did not provide a method that they could easily access, nor listened to our warnings and demands." Reminding that political prisoners, journalists and opponents did not benefit from the execution law that was enacted for the purpose of reducing the over population in prisons in this process, Çepni said, "The government almost wanted to take revenge with the pandemic. Everyone opposing the government are in prison, especially our Demirtaş and Yüksekdağ, our former co-chairs, were left alone with the pandemic."

 

REACTION TO LONG IMRPISONMENTS

 

Stating that the families complain about to long imprisonments, Çepni said: "Families were complaining about long imprisonments. Most of them has family members who are in prison for more than 20 years. Even though they have a few years to serve, they were not released due to the pandemic. There are seriously ill prisoners, but they are also not released. And even their sencences are done, some prisoners were sentenced to additional years as disciplinary punishment.

 

'ISOLATION IS THE POLICY IN THIS COUNTRY'

 

Underlining that the prisons are an area of resistance against the violations of rights and torture, Çepni said: "Because the people in these are there because thef fought for democracy. There is an ongoing hunger strike. The isolation of Abdullah Öcalan remains unsolved. The isolation in İmralı is not applied to once person but the whole society.  This is a state policy. In particular, the insolvency of the Kurdish problem is the result of the state's policy of denial and destruction. The longer the isolation lasts in İmralı, the more the deadlocked the Kurdish issue becomes. The hunger strike continues in rotations, demanding an end to the isolation and violations of rights in prisons. As HDP, we do our best to meet these demands. In addition, labor and democracy forces must embrace these demands. Because isolation has come out of İmralı, as we saw at Boğaziçi University, it has surrounded the whole society. Just like the trustees. We said that trustees are a policy towards not only HDP municipalities, but the whole society, and that when we remain silent, trustees will surround the society. Today we see that a trustee has been appointed to Boğaziçi University, and a law was passed to appoint trustees to non-governmental organizations. Policies that will appoint trustees to democratic mass organizations are just beyond the corner. With the entire country turned into an open prison, we have no choice but to stand up for these demands. "

 

 

MA / Sevda Aydın