National Collective for Women’s Rights, which gathers numerous feminist associations, trade unions and leftist political parties under its umbrella in France, issued a call for a march against the isolation and genocide policies by the Turkish state on February 20.

The march, called by the National Collective for Women’s Rights and the Kurdish Women’s Movement, will begin in the Republique Square in Paris on February 20, at 17:30.

The joint call said there are 260 political prisoners, 50 of them women, on an indefinite nonalternating hunger strike to break the isolation imposed upon Kurdish People’s Leader Abdullah Ocalan.

The Women’s Collective said the hunger strikes were kicked off by HDP MP Leyla Guven on November 8 and added: “Isolation is a crime against humanity and it violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.”

The call said there are over 20.000 political prisoners in Turkey under the shadow of the State of Emergency, including former HDP co-chairs, elected officials, 16 MPs and 9 co-mayors. It also mentioned the arrested NGO representatives, journalists, feminists, activists and some 2.800 minors and said: “Women are particularly targeted by this oppressive system.”

The call said, “All women’s associations, women’s centers, women’s news agency JINHA and women’s cooperatives were shut down. Currently, there are over 9.000 political prisoner women, 3.502 of whom have severe health issues.”

The call also stressed, “Leyla Guven symbolizes the resistance and courage of the Kurdish women who seek peace, equality and justice.”

The National Collective for Women’s Rights and the Kurdish Women’s Movement said:

“We must break the isolation regime and protest the fascist system imposed upon political prisoners. Breaking this system is imperative for peace, equality and democracy in Turkey and it will end Erdogan’s genocidal regime in Kurdistan.”