The isolation of Kurdish People’s Leader Abdullah Öcalan, who was brought to Turkey on February 15, 1999 as a result of an international conspiracy, enters its 19th year.

An international delegation consisting of 13 people from Social Democrat and Left Group parliamentarians of the European Parliament (EP) and academics has applied to the Turkish Justice Ministry in order to visit Öcalan on İmralı Island.

The delegation is made up of; Costas Mavrides from the Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament, British journalist and author Jonathan Steele, Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) and Group of the Unified European Left member Ulla Sandbaek, Member of the Parliament of Iceland, former Minister and Chairman of BSRB (Confederation of State and Municipal Employees of Iceland) Ögmundur Jonasson, former MEP Francis Wurtz, PACE member Miren Edurne Gorrotxategi, Chair of Westminster Justice and Peace Commission Joe Ryan, Westminster School of Geography at the University of Leeds and International Institute for Social Ecology Advisory Board Member Federico Venturini, International Institute for Social Ecology Advisor from Canada Dimitri Roussopoulos and Cambridge University Political Sociology Professor Dr. Thomas Jeffery Miley.

DELEGATION TO HAVE MEETINGS IN AMED

The international delegation HAS applied to the Turkish Justice Ministry of January 30, 2017 in order to meet with Öcalan. Delegation members will have meetings in Amed and Istanbul as they wait for the ministry’s response in the meantime. The delegation will inspect Amed and the other destroyed cities in North Kurdistan between February 13 and 16, inspect the arrest of HDP parliamentarians and usurpation of municipalities, and share their findings with the world public, the EP, the UN and other organizations in a report. Later, the delegation will meet with representatives of political parties and non-governmental organization and attend several conferences.

LETTER TO THE TURKISH MINISTRY OF JUSTICE

Costas Mavrides from the Group of the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament and

Progressive Socialists and Democrats Group Alliance EP member Costas Mavrides and MEP Julie Ward sent a letter to the Turkish Justice Minister Bekir Bozdağ on January 30 and demanded to meet with Kurdish People’s Leader Abdullah Öcalan on İmralı Island.

In their letter, the EP parliamentarians said “Mr. Bekir Bozdağ, we ask you to give us permission so that we can visit İmralı Prison, consult with Mr. Öcalan, and inform him so that the peace process can restart. We believe that Öcalan will give peaceful support to the Kurdish issue and the democratization process in Turkey. The Delegation asks for your permission to visit İmralı Prison on February 17, 18 or 19, 2017. If it is not possible for the entire delegation to visit, we ask that a small group visits the prison. We ask you to give your permission to a group that would be chosen from the delegation to visit İmralı. We also ask you to meet with one of our colleagues and exchange ideas on the restart of the peace process before the meeting with Mr. Öcalan. We will be honored if you respond to our requests positively. We await your response due to the seriousness and urgency of the situation.”