IHD publishes report about rights violations in prisons in Central Anatolia region

The IHD Ankara Branch published its report about the rights violations in prisons in the Central Anatolia region for October, November and December 2023.

Speaking at a press conference held in Ankara, Human Rights Association (IHD) Central Executive Board member Nuray Çevirmen, IHD Ankara Branch co-chair Ömer Faruk Yazıcı, and IHD Prisons Commission member Ümit Can Akbulut shared the report about the rights violations experienced in the months of October, November and December in the prisons of the Central Anatolia region.

According to the report, a total of 189 people applied to IHD, including 166 people from 31 closed prisons in the Central Anatolia region and 24 people from 13 prisons outside the region. At least 1,046 rights violations were detected within three months.

The report also said that at least 6 prisoners in different prisons in the Central Anatolia Region died within three months and 2 of them under suspicious circumstances.

As a reaction to the violations of rights, at least 4 prisoners in the prisons in the region started an indefinite and non-alternating hunger strike and some of them are still continuing the action.

The report added that political prisoners started periodic and rotating hunger strikes to protest the severe isolation conditions of Kurdish People's Leader Abdullah Öcalan.

The report also said that the Hunger Strike Monitoring Coordination was established together with health, legal, human rights and professional organizations in the prisons of the Central Anatolia region.

The report also underlined the violations against ill prisoners, saying that at least 286 violations of the right to health were recorded in the last three months.

The report pointed out that even the greeting of prisoners to each other was considered a reason for disciplinary punishment, and added that a total of 52 rights violations were registered.

In the final section of the report, 17-article suggestions were made, calling for compliance with national and international conventions and implementation of the Constitutional Court and the European Court of Human Rights decisions against human rights violations in prisons.

The IHD called on the authorities to immediately intervene to end the violations of rights in prisons and hold those responsible accountable.