TURKEY HUMAN RIGHTS PRACTICES, 1993

[newsdesk_aps_nl at apsf.aps.nl]

From: newsdesk_aps_nl at apsf.aps.nl (newsdesk at aps.nl)
Subject: TURKEY HUMAN RIGHTS PRACTICES, 1993   PART 5B


TURKEY HUMAN RIGHTS PRACTICES, 1993   part 5b

Source:  U.S.  Department of State


From: kendal at nucst9.neep.wisc.edu (Kendal)
Date: 4 Feb 1994 21:46:43 GMT
Distribution: world



Turkish security authorities have been charged with driving 200
Syriac Christians from the village of Hassana in Mardin
province in November.  According to reports from villagers, the
order came to evacuate the village because of a statement by a
local tribal leader that it was an Armenian village, and
Turkish officials often accuse Armenians of supporting the
PKK.  The villagers were reportedly moved to a neighboring
village, to Midyat, and to the city of Mardin.  In a separate
incident, village guards investigating an arson attack on an
electricity station in Alagoz village in Mardin province
allegedly seized seven Syriac Christian shepherds.  The seven
were released after a night in detention.  A resident who saw
them after their release claimed the shepards had been tortured
and one had a cross burnt into his chest with molten plastic.

The Government organizes, arms, and pays for a civil defense
force in the southeast known as the village guards.
Participation in the paramilitary militia by local villagers is
theoretically voluntary, but villagers are in effect caught
between the two sides.  If the villagers agree to serve, the
PKK may target them and their village.  If the villagers refuse
to participate, government security forces may retaliate
against them and their village.  On June 21, several hundred
Jandarma reportedly entered the village of Ortasar, Diyarbakir
province, where the villagers had refused to join the village
guard militia, rounded up all the inhabitants, male and female,
and began beating them with their rifle butts.  Some villagers
were given electric shocks and burned with cigarettes.  Several
were detained, two of whom returned the following day "in an
unrecognizable state" due to ill-treatment.  On June 25, the
Jandarma returned to the village and threatened to kill any
villagers who complained to newspapers or the local human
rights organizations.

There were also unsubstantiated claims of government forces
preventing injured villagers or PKK members from seeking
medical help, as well as instances of physicians who were
prosecuted for giving medical care to alleged PKK terrorists, a
practice that could deter other physicians from extending such
aid.  For example, Dr. Ilhan Diken was tried at Diyarbakir
state security court for treating a wounded PKK militant, an
offense for which the court demanded a 5-year sentence.  As of
the end of the year, the case has not concluded.

Throughout 1993 there were reports of an undeclared food
embargo on the towns of Uludere and Guclukonak in Sirnak
province.  Initially, HEP deputies charged that security forces
had imposed the embargo to intimidate the populace.  When a
Motherland Party delegation visited the head of the Siirt HRA
branch in February, he claimed the embargo had been imposed
because state-paid village guards refused to continue to
serve.  As of August, the villages were reported by the
mainstream press to be suffering a food embargo at the hands of
the PKK, which accused their inhabitants of collaborating with
the State.

In mid-March the PKK declared a unilateral cease-fire; it
claimed it no longer insisted on an independent Kurdish state
and wanted to pursue its objectives through the democratic
channels available in Turkey.  For the most part, the PKK
suspended its hostile operations, although it did not withdraw
its guerrillas.  The Government refused to open discussions
with the terrorist PKK.  Not recognizing the cease-fire, the
Government continued its military operations against alleged
PKK targets.  On May 24, the same day the Government had
approved a partial amnesty, the PKK abruptly terminated its own
cease-fire with an ambush on a convoy of soldiers (see Section
1.a.).  Although the PKK leadership later publicly expressed
regret about the incident, the ambush signaled renewed
hostilities, which were accompanied by a sharp increase in
reports of human rights abuses by both sides in 1993.

On June 8, the Government put into effect a limited amnesty for
PKK members.  Under the terms of the amnesty, "those who are
not members of an armed organization, but who are in the
organization for another reason, will not be prosecuted if they
have not committed any crime and if they give themselves up
voluntarily."  "For another reason" appears to mean that
persons who were kidnaped, pressured into cooperation, or
otherwise involuntarily involved in the PKK's activities will
not be prosecuted.  The burden of proof, however, appears to
lie with those who surrender to the State.  According to the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 95 persons took advantage of the
limited amnesty offer.

Government state of emergency decree 430, codified in 1990 and
most recently renewed in November, imposes stringent security
measures in the southeast.  The regional governor may censor
news, ban strikes or lockouts, and impose internal exile (see
Section 1.d.).  The decree also provides for doubling the
sentences of those convicted of cooperating with separatists.
Informants and convicted persons who cooperate with the State
are eligible for rewards and reduced sentences.  Provisions in
the decree that specifically prohibited court challenges to the
regional governor's administrative decisions were amended in
1992 to permit limited judicial review.

In November the Government introduced amendments to the
Anti-Terror Law that would broaden the definitions of terrorism
and collaboration, place more stringent restrictions on the
press, and increase the permissible length of incommunicado
prearraignment detention.  As of the end of the year, the bill
was still pending in Parliament's joint Justice/Interior
Committee.

Section 2  Respect for Civil Liberties, Including:

     a.  Freedom of Speech and Press

Despite constitutional provisions for freedom of speech and
press, there were significant limitations on these freedoms,
which came under increasing pressure in 1993.

The Anti-Terror Law and Penal Code provisions that make it a
crime to insult Kemal Ataturk, secularism, Islam, the security
forces, and the President, are used to restrict free
expression.  In some cases, the laws provide for increased
punishment if the offense is committed in a publication.  The
press law permits prosecutors to halt distribution of a
newspaper or magazine without a court order and requires that
each publication's "responsible editors" bear legal
responsibility for the publication's content.

After the leftwing daily newspaper Aydinlik announced on May 23
that it would publish excerpts from Salman Rushdie's book, "The
Satanic Verses," its offices, vendors, and distributors were
attacked several times in the following week.  Reportedly, the
newspaper asked for police protection but did not receive it.
The Government confiscated all 12 issues of Aydinlik which
printed the excerpts and brought the paper and its chief editor
to trial under the Penal Code for insulting Islam.  (See also
Section 1.a.)

The unsolved murders of five journalists (see Section 1.a.) and
the failure of the Government to charge a single suspect, even
in a high-profile case such as that of Ugur Mumcu, led
populace, officials, and international organizations alike to
denounce government inaction.  The International Federation of
Journalists sent a delegation to Turkey to investigate the
increasing number of unsolved murder cases affecting members of
the press.


Several organized panel discussions were banned in 1993,
including a symposium on the Kurdish issue, organized jointly
by the HRA and a number of Turkish intellectuals, which was to
be held in Ankara on June 25-27.  President Demirel, the acting
Prime Minister, and other political party leaders were to have
delivered speeches on the Kurdish issue at the symposium.  In a
letter sent to the HRA, the Ankara deputy governor wrote that
the symposium had been banned on the grounds that it could have
"grave consequences in the light of the latest developments in
the country."  (See also Section 2.b.)

Throughout the year, state security court prosecutors ordered
the confiscation of numerous issues of leftist and pro-Kurdish
periodicals, including Yeni Ulke, Newroz magazine, Ozgur
Gundem, and Azadi.  Many editions of Kurdish-oriented
periodicals were seized before they could be distributed
nationally to newsstands.  Court proceedings were instituted
against several editors and publishers.  PEN reported that as
of mid-September more than 70 court cases were pending against
Ozgur Gundem.  Its editor in chief Davut Karadag was arrested
at the behest of the Istanbul state security court on July 15
on charges of spreading subversive Kurdish propaganda in 30
news items in the daily's July 12, 13, 14, and 15 issues.
Karadag was released from custody on September 17.  No decision
has yet been reached in that case, but in another case, Karadag
was given a 5-month sentence.

The Anti-Terror Law, which provides that "written and oral
propaganda...aiming at damaging the indivisible unity of the
State of the Turkish Republic...(is) forbidden, regardless of
the method, intention and ideas behind it," severely restricts
freedom of speech.  It had a chilling effect against writers,
journalists, publishers, politicians, musicians, and students
and has been used against them.  A number of prominent,
generally center-left and pro-Kurdish politicians were detained
under, or otherwise affected by, the Anti-Terror Law in 1993
for speeches made both within Turkey and beyond the country's
borders.  The HEP and its successor, the DEP, representing
Kurdish interests, are particularly targeted.  For example, DEP
chairman and Ozgur Gundem owner Yasar Kaya was ordered arrested
in September by the Ankara state security court prosecutor for
"separatist" language he had allegedly used in an August speech
at a political party congress in Erbil, northern Iraq.  This
case was subsequently combined with another case against him
for a speech he made in Bonn, Germany.