United Resistance Brings Victory

[kurd-l at burn.ucsd.edu]

From: Arm The Spirit <ats at locust.cic.net>

United Resistance Brings Victory

12 Political Prisoners Gave Their Lives In A Death Fast In
Turkey

By Arm The Spirit

(ATS Note: The following article was written for "Prison News Service", a
North American prison journal. They can be reached at: PNS, P.O. Box 5052,
Stn. A, Toronto, Ont., M5W 1W4 Canada. E-mail: pns at pathcom.com)

When Aygun Ugur, an imprisoned militant from the outlawed Turkish
Communist Party/Marxist-Leninist (TKP/ML), died on the 63rd day
of a hungerstrike, Turkey was shocked. In a nation which is
continually rocked by political crises and rebellion, this
summer's death fast by left-wing political prisoners posed the
greatest threat to the the Turkish government in recent years.
Weeks of public denial and fierce repression could not stop the
prisoners, and in the days after Ugur's death, 11 more martyrs
were to fall in Europe's most serious political hungerstrike
since 10 Irish POW's died in the 1981 IRA/INLA hungerstrike.

This summer's hungerstrike, the climax of more than a year of
continued prison resistance in Turkey and Kurdistan, began on May
19, 1996. At the outset, more than 1,500 political prisoners took
part, most from militant communist organizations such as the
Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C), the
TKP/ML, and others. Kurdish political prisoners, mostly from the
Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), soon joined in as well, and the
resistance displayed a great deal of unity among Turkey's
fractured radical-left and leftist Kurdish groups as well.

The main impetus for this latest hungerstrike was the order which
was issued on May 6, 1996 by the new Turkish Justice Minister
Mehmet Agar. Ever since inconclusive parliamentary elections in
December 1995 had left Turkey in a state of political stalemate,
a shaky coalition government was evetually formed by the two main
secular conservative parties, the True Path Party (DYP) and the
Motherland Party (ANAP). Mehmet Agar was well known to leftists
in Turkey, especially the prisoners, and his career as a
policeman and politician was one marked by torture, murder, and
bloodshed. Agar had served as police chief in Ankara following
the September 9, 1980 military coup, and his tenure there was
marked by the death of scores of revolutionaries. In 1990, Agar
became police chief in Istanbul, where he continued his reign of
terror. According the the DHKC Information Office in Amsterdam,
police raids directed by Agar resulted in the deaths of 124
left-wing militants with another 22 tortured to death. Agar was
also responsible for the murder of 8 left-wing journalists and
the imprisonment of 55 others.

Mehmet Agar's May 6th order announced the establishment of
several new special isolation prisons in Eskisehir and other
cities, and the planned dispersal of political prisoners to
remote areas far away from their families and lawyers. This order
marked the highpoint of increased repression against political
prisoners in Turkey and Kurdistan.

Turkey has a long history of militant left-wing struggle,
especially since the 1970s, and prison resistance has always been
an integral part of movement activity. Following the 1980
military coup, when thousands of militants were imprisoned and
tortured, there were several waves of hungerstrikes and prison
resistance, organized mainly by the urban guerrilla organization
Devrimci Sol (now known as the DHKP-C) and the PKK. But the
return of "democracy" to Turkey in the 1980s did not mean that
prison conditions became any better. Indeed, following the
launching of the PKK's armed struggle offensive in Kurdistan in
1984 and the hanging of martial law over all Kurdish provinces in
1987, the repression in the prisons became much worse as the
number of political prisoners began to rise.

In the 1990s, prison resistance continued, and one of the largest
hungerstrikes in Turkish history began on July 14, 1995, when
nearly 10,000 Kurdish political prisoners and prisoners of war
began a hungerstrike to demand better prison conditions and to
call for an end to the dirty war in Kurdistan. July 14th is a
significant date in history for the PKK movement. It recalls the
hungerstrike launched on July 14, 1982 by PKK cadre Hayri Durmus,
Kemal Pir, Ali Cicek, and Akif Yilmaz, all of whom fell as
martrys in their resistance. A wave of solidarity hungerstrikes
by Kurds across Europe and even in America, including clashes
with riot police in London and several German cities, helped draw
international attention to the war in Kurdistan and to the plight
of political prisoners in Turkey. But this hungerstrike ended
without achieving any results after 35 days. Four people were
martyred in this hungerstrike: Fesih Beyazcicek, Remzi Altinas,
Latifa Kaya, and Gulnaz Baghistani; Gulnaz died in Berlin,
Germany following a police attack on Kurdish solidarity
hungerstrikers.

Prison resistance spread from Kurdistan during the summer of
1995, particularly following the dramatic escape from prison on
July 17, 1995 of four DHKC prisoners. Their escape led to a wave
of repression against other prisoners and prisoners' families,
and resistance to state terror in the prisons eventually took the
form of a nationwide prison uprising on September 12, 1995. Both
Kurdish and Turkish political prisoners from several left-wing
organizations acted together during this resistance. The state
responded with heavy force, however, attacking Buca prison in
Izmir on September 21, 1995. A raid by soldiers and police on the
prison left 3 DHKC prisoners dead and another 60 prisoners
seriously wounded.

Resistance and repression continued, however, and soon Urmaniye
prison in Istanbul became the focus. On December 13, 1995, the
police and army attacked rebellious inmates, even using
helicopters, leaving 1 dead and scores more wounded. But
prisoners successfully barricaded themselves and held off the
state forces until another, more deadly state attack on January
4, 1996 left yet another 3 DHKC prisoners dead. By this point, a
rather large movement outside the prisons had formed and began
taking to the streets to demand an end to torture and death in
Turkish prisons. Following the January 4th massacre, Turkish
targets across Germany were firebombed, and thousands of people
in Turkey took to the streets in protest. At the funeral for two
of the DHKC martyrs, riot police in Istanbul made some 4,000
arrests, injuring scores of people. World-wide attention became
focused on the situation in Turkey's prisons following this,
largely due to the murder by police of Emin Goktepe. Emin, a
journalist for the leftist daily "Evrensel", was dragged away by
police during the funeral procession in Istanbul. His battered
corpse was found in a ditch a few days later. Turkish police at
first denied they had any knowledge of Emin's murder, but
overwhelming evidence soon proved to the world that Emin was the
latest in a series of "disappearances" and murders of leftist
journalists in Turkey. Bowing to pressure from the European
Parliament, several Istanbul police officers were indicted for
Emin's murder this spring.

It was against this background of continued intense repression
that the May 19th hungerstrike was launched. Prisoners demanded
that the May 6th order be rescinded, that all special isolation
prisons be closed down, and they also demanded an end to the
attacks on family members and lawyers which have become so
routine in Turkey and Kurdistan. The collapse of the DYP-ANAP
right-wing coalition in May changed the situation slightly,
however. A new coalition, made up of former Prime Minister Tansu
Ciller's DYP party and the Islamic Refah Party, removed Agar and
named Refah member Sevket Kazan to be the new Justice Minister.
At this point, PKK prisoners halted their hungerstrike,
apparently fooled by promises of reform. But the prisoners from
the Turkish left continued and indeed escalated their resistance.
After all, fascism is fascism, for despite Refah's occasional
anti-Western rhetoric, the party still must do the bidding of the
oligarchy and the military to stay in power, and the party's
Islamic fundamentalism does not mean that its ideology is any
less nationalistic or reactionary than its DYP-ANAP secular
counterparts.

The analysis by the DHKC and others proved correct, as Kazan
promised to continue with the state attacks on revolutionary
prisoners and to push through the new restrictions and special
prisons. The hungerstike became a death fast, with hundreds of
prisoners vowing to perish before they would cease their
resistance. State repression was heightened, and a media
black-out was ordered by the Refah government, reminiscent of the
German state's repressive measures during the RAF hungerstrike in
the autumn of 1977. But Turkey's political prisoners are very
well-organized and resourceful, and they managed to smuggle a
video tape of the prison conditions and the death fast to the
outside. When these images were broadcast to Turkey and the
world, the government could no longer deny the resistance which
was underway. Rallies by prisoners' families and supporters grew.
Riots broke out in the Gazi district of Istanbul and other areas
as well. The state vowed never to negotiated with "terrorists",
but when Aygun Ugur fell on July 21st, the situation changed. In
the following days, more prisoners died, and yet the resistance
continued. By now, the bourgeois left were shocked, and even
pro-state media began to question the inhumane stance of the new
regime. Sedat Ergin, a leading newspaper commentator in Ankara,
noted that the fast had become a "direct challenge" to Prime
Minister Erbakan's new Islamic government. On July 25th, with 8
strikers already dead, the Kurdish PKK prisoners announced that
they too would join the death fast. The Kurdistan Parliament in
Exile in Europe issued a declaration in support of the
hungerstrikers. With social discontent and protest mounting, the
media black-out having failed to keep a lid on the situation,
famed author Yasar Kemal and other noted human rights activists
attempted to mediate between the prisoners and the state. On
Saturday, July 28, 1996, the prisoners announced that the death
fast was over when the government gave in to all their demands.

The government stated it would close down the Eskisehir prison in
central Anatolia, it would stop the dispersal of prisoners to
remote locations, end the attacks on family members and lawyers,
and seek to improve prison conditions. After 69 days of
determined resistance and the death of 12 prisoners, the
hungerstrike by Turkish revolutionaries ended in victory. But
Turkey is still a country in turmoil. As the urban underclasses
continue to rise up in the cities in the west and the Kurdish
liberation struggles gains in strength in the east, state
repression will continue, and this summer's hungerstrike will
certainly not be the last in the struggle for socialism and
freedom in Turkey and Kurdistan.

Arm The Spirit, September 1996

The following martyrs fell during the 69-day hungerstrike: 

Aygun Ugur (TKP/ML), Altan Berdan Kerimgiller (DHKP-C), Olginc
Ozkeskin (DHKP-C), Huseyin Demircioglu (MLKP), Ali Ayata,
(TKP/ML), Mujdat Yanat (DHKP-C), Tahsin Yilmaz (TIKB), Ayse Idil
Erkmen (DHKP-C), Hicabi Kucuk (TIKB), Yemliha Kaya (DHKP-C),
Osman Akgun (TIKB) and Hayati Can (TKP/ML).

For more information on the liberation struggle in Turkey and
Kurdistan, visit the DHKP-C homepage on the Internet:
http://www.xs4all.nl/~ozgurluk 

Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ont.
M5W 1P7 Canada

E-mail: ats at etext.org
Arm The Spirit's homepage: http://burn.ucsd.edu/~ats

(Source: Prison News Service #55 - Fall 1996)

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Arm The Spirit is an autonomist/anti-imperialist information
collective based in Toronto, Canada. Our focus includes a wide 
variety of material, including political prisoners, national 
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Arm The Spirit
P.O. Box 6326, Stn. A
Toronto, Ontario
M5W 1P7 Canada

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