From: Press Agency Ozgurluk <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Sat, 19 May 2001 21:04:33 +0200 To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [Ozgurluk] Reuters: Dying Hunger Strikers' Voices Go Unheard in Turkey Saturday May 19 10:47 AM ET Dying Hunger Strikers' Voices Go Unheard in Turkey By Ayla Jean Yackley ISTANBUL, Turkey (Reuters) - In an airy room overlooking the Bosphorus straits, Zehra Kulaksiz, a pretty 22-year-old college student, counts the days until she dies. This week she marks the 180th day of her hunger strike to protest against Turkish prison conditions. Two other women and one man are also starving themselves to death in the house; none has much confidence that the government will meet their demands before they die. ``The government does not pay attention to our cause, so I may die before they hear our call,'' Kulaksiz said, speaking slowly, her voice hoarse. Three women including her sister Canan, 19, have died already in the house in a tough working-class neighborhood in Istanbul with leftist graffiti scrawled on the walls. Turkey's Human Rights Association says 22 people in all have died in the mass ''death fast'' and 60 others are on the verge of death. Nearly 300 inmates and six family members continue their death fasts in an attempt to force the government to reconsider its plan to move inmates from decaying dormitory-style wards to 11 newly built cell-based jails, which cost $4.5 million each. They say the new penitentiaries will isolate inmates, increasing the risk of torture, which human rights groups say remains unchecked in Turkish prisons. The government has largely ignored the protesters. Accustomed to Western criticism of its human rights record, Turkey has also shrugged off calls from international groups, including the Council of Europe and Amnesty International, to end the six-month prison crisis. European Union (news - web sites) enlargement commissioner Guenter Verheugen urged Ankara this week to accelerate prison reforms. ``Whatever the political views the organizers of the strike may have, the present situation in our view is a cause of concern from a humanitarian point of view,'' Verheugen said. PROTESTERS BRANDED 'TERRORISTS' Authorities call the protesters ``terrorists'' and insist the new jails, with modern washrooms, kitchens and courtyards, meet the standards of the EU, which Turkey wants to join. Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit said last month the government would not be pressured by the mounting death toll to roll back changes in the penitentiary system. ``Everybody should know the prisons will not be the headquarters of terrorist organizations again,'' he said. Many of the old wards built inexpensively to hold up to 100 men are run by organized criminals and political prisoners. Gangs recruit new members and smuggle in cell phones and weapons that have been used to stage riots and hostage-taking. Two soldiers and 30 inmates died in December when security forces stormed jails across the country to end the standoff. Since then, the hunger strike has largely fallen off the public agenda and Turkish newspapers give scant coverage to the deaths in a country preoccupied with a severe financial crisis. ``The Turkish public isn't clairvoyant,'' Jonathon Sugden of New York-based Human Rights Watch said. ``There has been a very efficient news blackout, with only the government providing information about prisoners, and it has not been forthcoming.'' The Justice Ministry declined requests for an interview. Parliament amended an ``anti-terrorism law'' May 1 to allow some political prisoners access to communal areas, but Sugden says inmates' families report that no prisoners have yet benefited from the new rule and the lockdown continues. ``They should be doing everything they can during this critical time to show those on the hunger strike they are moving in the right direction,'' he said. ``Instead there has been complete idleness.'' PROTESTERS'S DEMANDS VARY Kulaksiz, whose uncle is on hunger strike in prison, says the death fast is her last resort. Turkish authorities arrested hundreds of sympathizers at street protests last year. The first hunger strikers started their protest Oct. 20 and have prolonged their lives by consuming liquids, sugar, salt and vitamin tablets. Most belong to radical leftist groups, and their demands range from ending isolation in the new prisons to broader human rights. A few have even called on Ankara give up its crisis remedy pact with the International Monetary Fund (news - web sites). ``I want all Turks to be able to enjoy the bounties of Anatolia, to enjoy its fruit, its sun, its factories,'' said Hulya Simsek, 38, who had refused food for 179 days as of May 17 and shares a room with Kulaksiz. Simsek rails against the IMF, globalization and Turkey's bourgeoisie and spends her days reading poetry and drawing pictures, which hang on the walls of the concrete house. ``I want everyone to live life like in these pictures,'' she said, her words slurring. She complains that her muscles ache constantly and she suffers from insomnia. Cagri Temucin, a member of the Ankara Chamber of Physicians, which has been monitoring the condition of about 60 hunger strikers in hospitals, says many are exhibiting symptoms of Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome, including hallucinations, memory loss and childlike behavior. Temucin says doctors are ethically bound not to treat those who refuse it. Some of the men weigh as little as 65 pounds. ``The situation is out of our control. It's a painful tableau to see so many people dying when we cannot stop it,'' he said. Kulaksiz, who has pictures of her late sister on the walls of her room, is unable to walk and goes outside in a wheelchair to sit in the sun. She says she is not afraid to die. ``I want to live, just as anyone else. I love life,'' Kulaksiz said softly. ``But I know if I die I will save hundreds of lives. With each death, our voice becomes louder and eventually I believe the government will hear us.'' -- Press Agency Ozgurluk In Support of the Revolutionary Peoples Liberation Struggle in Turkey http://www.ozgurluk.org _________________________________________________ KOMINFORM P.O. 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