APPEAL FOR THE IMMEDIATE RELEASE OF LAWYERS IN TURKEY
We wish to express our deep concern about the new wave of mass arrests taking place in Turkey. This time the victims of Turkey’s repression are the country’s lawyers. According to The Economist, 47 lawyers were arrested last week; while other reports put the figure at 51.
While the arrests were taking place the President of Turkey Abdullah Gul was on a state visit in London where his country was extolled as a model democracy to be emulated throughout the Middle East. And yet, Turkey has arrested lawyers for simply representing their clients.
In the last seven months 4,547 people have been detained and 1,838 remanded in custody, according to the BDP (Peace and Democracy Party) Law Commission. The “KCK” operation has been targeting Kurdish politicians and institutions since April 2009, criminalising all Kurdish civil, social, public and cultural organisations by spuriously linking them to a very broadly defined conception of terrorism. The detainees include democratically elected MPs, mayors and city councillors, journalists, trade unionists, writers, academics, teachers and human rights activists.
Now, lawyers acting for the detainees have been charged with terrorism offences, in what amounts to guilt by association. The arrested lawyers also include members of the legal team of Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), held in jail for well over a decade.
The lawyers’ offences appear to be discharging their normal professional duties carried out in the course of representing their clients. We are sure that you agree that an independent judicial process is one of the bedrocks of a functioning democracy and in a free society lawyers must be allowed to perform their advocacy role as a matter of right. These basic principles are presently being undermined in Turkey.
We urge you to use your influence with the Turkish Government to ensure the immediate release of all lawyers currently detained and enable them to take up their independent advocacy roles in the interests of securing justice for all the people of Turkey.
Peace in Kurdistan Campaign
Signed by
Margaret Owen OBE, human rights lawyer; Widows for Peace through Democracy
Musa Moris Farhi MBE
John Berger, writer and art critic
Christine Blower, General Secretary, National Union of Teachers (NUT)
Mike Mansfield QC
Professor Roy Greenslade, City University London
Louise Christian, human rights lawyer
Dr Vicki Sentas, School of Law, King’s College London
Professor Bill Bowring, Barrister, Director of the LLM/MA in Human Rights, School of Law, Birkbeck, University of London
Brice Dickson, Professor of International and Comparative Law at Queen’s University, Belfast
Henry Porter, novelist and political columnist for Observer Newspaper, London
Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers
Liz David, barrister, Garden Court Chambers
Michael Ivers, barrister, Garden Court Chambers
Rajiv Menon QC, barrister, Garden Court Chambers
Lord Rea
Lord Hylton
Jean Lambert MEP
Jill Evans MEP
Bairbre de Brún MEP
Carolyne Lucas MP
Jeremy Corbyn MP
Hywel Williams MP
John Austin (former MP)
Mark Durkan MP
Katy Clark MP
Hugo Charlton, barrister, 1 Grays Inn
Alastair Lyon, solicitor, Birnberg Peirce & Partners
Matt Foot, solicitor, Birnberg Peirce & Partners
Russell Frazer, solicitor, Birnberg Peirce & Partners
Dr Felix Padel, anthropologist and writer
Jonathan Fryer, writer and broadcaster
Tim Gopsill, Editor of Free Press, Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom
Stan Newens, former MP and MEP, President of Liberation
Dafydd Iwan B.Arch., LL.D. Past President, Plaid Cymru
Dr Omer Moore, human rights lawyer
Alain Hertzmann, Branch secretary, London North West Branch 9708, Unitetheunion
Maggie Bowden General Secretary, Liberation
Saleh Mamon, Campaign Against Criminalising Communities (CAMPACC)
Anne Costello, Campaign Against Criminalising Communitites (CAMPACC)
Richard Haley, Scotland Against Criminalising Communities (SACC)
Stephen Smellie, Deputy Convenor UNISON Scotland
Father Joe Ryan, Justice and Peace Commission – Dioceses of Westminster
Nick Hildyard, policy adviser
Dr. Gwenllian Lansdown Davies, former Chief Executive of Plaid Cymru
Kariane Westrheim, PhD, Associate Professor, Department of Education Faculty of Psychology, University of Bergen, Norway
Mike Arnott, Rector’s Assessor, University of Dundee
Hannah Rought-Brooks, barrister, Tooks Chambers
Jonathan Bloch, LibDem councillor, Haringey, London
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Peace in Kurdistan
Campaign for a political solution of the Kurdish Question
Email: estella24@tiscali.co.uk
Contacts Estella Schmid 020 7586 5892 & Melanie Sirinathsingh – Tel: 020 7272 4131