Kurds and unions victims of Turkish state repression

While the media is full of reports of the arrest of alleged coup plotters in Turkey, the military top brass will be reassured by the continuing state repression of not only the Kurdish minority but also the harsh treatment meted out to their legal representatives.

On Christmas eve, there was the mass arrest of some 80 leading members of the new Peace and Democracy Party (BDP). The action followed the banning of the popular pro-Kurdish Democratic Society Party (DTP) on by Turkey’s Constitutional Court. Those detained are all former pro-Kurdish deputies or mayors.

Earlier this year, a 15-year-old girl, a Turkish Kurd, named Berivan, was jailed in Turkey for nearly eight years – reduced on appeal from thirteen and a half years - after being convicted of "terrorist" offences. She was arrested at a demonstration in the south-eastern city of Batman in October 2009.

She was found guilty of "crimes on behalf of an illegal organisation" after prosecutors alleged she had hurled stones and shouted slogans. She was also convicted of attending "meetings and demonstrations in opposition to the law" and "spreading propaganda for an illegal organisation".

According to the Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers, under counter-terrorism legislation introduced in 2006, Turkey has been trying juveniles as adults, and jailing them for up to 50 years. Recent official figures have revealed that there are currently 2,622 minors in Turkish prisons. According to the Diyarbakir Human Rights Association, some 737 minors have been charged under the counter-terrorism legislation since its introduction.

Between 1959 and 2009, Turkey was the worst violator of the European Convention on Human Rights, with almost 19% of all violations, and 2,295 judgements issued against it. Turkey also had the highest proportion of violations in 2009, with 347 out of 1,625 negative rulings. The right most commonly violated was the right to a fair trial. Turkey was also condemned in 30 cases of inhumane or degrading treatment.

Then this month came the news that the lawyers, Irfan Dündar and Firat Aydinkaya, who act on behalf of imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan, have been sentenced in Istanbul for "spreading propaganda for a terror organisation". The Istanbul 10th High Criminal Court gave both lawyers prison sentences of ten months each, suspended for five years.

Ocalan's lawyers were sentenced because of the appearance of a newspaper article entitled "A chance for Öcalan" published in Özgür Gündem on 29 and 30 April 2009. The court stated that the article included phrases made by Dündar and Aydinkakya such as "The lawyers conveyed Öcalan's opinion on the developments within KONGRA-GEL [Kurdish national movement PKK]", "He is experiencing the pain of change" and "Öcalan's opinions are important for an enduring peace".

In a statement, the Haldane Society said: “Informed by the findings of a number of its members who participated in an International Delegation to Turkey in February 2008, the Haldane Society firmly believes that the sentence reflects the intolerable conditions under which lawyers acting for the Kurdish leader have been subject since his apprehension in 1999 and the subsequent trial.

“Unfortunately, it is nothing new for not only have they been subjected to various forms of harassment and intimidation while performing their normal professional duties and seeking to represent their client, they have been treated as terror suspects themselves. The fact is that Turkish law as presently constituted permits such charges to be routinely brought against lawyers simply for putting across the case of their client.”

In a past period, British trade unions and human rights organisations campaigned against taking holidays in Spain when it was under the Franco dictatorship. It’s about time this tradition was resurrected in relation to Turkey and not just because of the persecution of the Kurds. On 7 December, virtually the entire executive committee as well as some local branch office officials of Nakliyat-Is, a trade union which organises transport workers, were arrested and the union headquarters raided. What is the Trades Union Congress waiting for?

Paul Feldman
Communications editor

Kick Israeli match into touch

When it comes to trade boycotts, countries like the United States decide them on the basis of pure politics. Cuba and Iran – boycott. Israel, Saudi Arabia – sell them as many weapons as you can. But when trade unions and campaign groups propose a boycott in support of Palestinian rights, they are accused of “playing politics” and even, outrageously, of anti-Semitism. The stench of hypocrisy is positively overwhelming. But the pressure is so intense when it comes to Israel, that many cave in. For example, the National Union of Journalists’ national executive has voted unanimously to lay aside a motion passed at its annual conference to support a boycott of Israeli goods and to ask the Trades Union Congress to lead a national campaign.

A vicious backlash began as soon as the motion was adopted in April. Floods of emails from pro-Israeli groups arrived at the NUJ’s offices. Prominent members of the union organised a petition at the BBC, which attracted over 600 signatures. Over 30 members resigned from the union. The TUC then told the NUJ that it had no intention of organising a boycott on the spurious grounds that such action “would undermine our ability to act as go-betweens”. That gave the NUJ leaders a way out and the executive voted to bury the boycott campaign, with general secretary Jeremy Dear declaring: “I don’t believe it serves the interest of the union in workplaces at a time when we are facing job cuts that members should be discussing a boycott of Israeli goods.” As job cuts are routine in the industry, it means that there will never be a right time to discuss the issue. And so the Palestinians will remain isolated and have to make do with a few speeches from Dear and others in favour of their rights.

Others are not so easily cowered. The Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the Boycott Israeli Goods Campaign, Jews for Boycott of Israeli Goods and Friends of Al Aqsa UK are calling for action against the England-Israel 2008 Euro qualifier match scheduled for Wembley on 8th September. In an open letter sent to football’s governing bodies, they point out that the Palestinian people are experiencing their 40th year of Israeli military occupation. They add: “Israel continues to build the illegal apartheid wall, annexing vast swathes of Palestinian land in the West Bank and creating Palestinian ghettos, despite the ruling of the International Court of Justice that it is illegal. Palestinians are effectively barred from international football by the extreme restrictions placed on them by the Israeli occupation. In September 2005, Palestine was in a good position in its Asian zone group in the qualifying rounds for the 2006 World Cup, but the Israeli authorities stopped five key players travelling outside Gaza and Palestine failed to qualify. In April last year, Israeli missiles destroyed the only stadium in Gaza, where 1.2 million Palestinians live. Israeli authorities admitted that the stadium was specifically targeted.”

A broad alliance of Palestinian civil society groups has called for an international movement of boycott and sanctions against Israel. This movement is partly based on the boycott movement against apartheid South Africa. South Africa was barred from the Olympic Games as well as international cricket and rugby until 1992. The sporting boycott played an part in isolating the regime and helping to bring about its demise. We should support the campaign against the England-Israel match and in doing so demonstrate that actions speak louder than words.

Paul Feldman, AWTW communications editor

Double standards over Israel boycott

The denial of education, of work, of any possibility of a future lies behind the communal fighting raging in Gaza today. The Israeli, US and British governments are guilty of fomenting these tragic events by refusing to recognise the democratically-elected Hamas government, cutting off vital aid to the Palestinian territories, while funding and arming rival Fatah forces. To criticise the Israeli government, however, is to risk bringing down the wrath of Zionism on your head, as the University and College Union (UCU) has found out. UCU members at their conference last month, instructed their (unwilling) leaders to circulate a call for a boycott of Israeli academic institutions to UK universities and colleges. Dr Sue Blackwell, a linguistics lecturer at the University of Birmingham, is a key supporter of the resolution, and told the conference: "We have voted to discuss how best to help our Palestinian brothers and sisters who often are not allowed to get to college or university and that is what we will do."

Timed to coincide with the UCU resolution, four Israeli university presidents and a number of prominent authors including Amos Oz and David Grossman, called on their government to lift all restrictions on Palestinian students. Palestinian students in Gaza are banned from travelling to universities on the West Bank. The Birzeit university is calling for a worldwide campaign to "break the siege" of education. The university is battling to survive under pressure of the occupation. It usually receives $1.5m a year from the Palestinian Authority. But since the economic blockade of Palestine that followed the election of the Hamas government, they have received just barely a fifth of that. Staff go unpaid and courses are suffering. Some 3,000 students have not been able to pay their fees – 43% of the student body.

Since the UCU conference, Zionists have launched a vicious campaign against Dr Blackwell and her supporters, hurling the ludicrous charge of anti-Semitism at them. As a linguistics professor Dr Blackwell will no doubt be struck by the astonishing double standards around the phrase "academic freedom". Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard law professor, has been recruited to a legal campaign by British lawyer Anthony Julius against any boycott. Dershowitz says that if the union goes ahead with this "immoral petition", it will "destroy British academia" and warns he has recruited "100 lawyers to break the boycott". Julius claims that British Jews are appalled by the UCU decision and believe there are "double standards when it comes to Israel". What about double standards when it comes to Palestinian academic freedom? Not an issue for him and his 100 lawyers, clearly. And what about double standards when it comes to the academic freedom of Jews who do not support his position. Julius must know that Dershowitz has successfully orchestrated a campaign to have an American Jewish academic Norman Finkelstein sacked from his post at De Paul university in Chicago. Finkelstein was subjected to a vicious campaign to prevent him being offered tenure, The reasons are simple. His books, including The Holocaust Industry and Beyond Chutzpah: On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History, have shown how the accusation of anti-Semitism is used to prevent any criticism of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians. Finkelstein, the son of Holocaust survivors, has condemned the decision to deny him tenure as an act of political aggression. He had the support of his own department, but the De Paul board caved in under external pressure. He will lose his job at the end of the academic year but says: "They can deny me tenure, deny me the right to teach. But they will never stop me from saying what I believe."

Penny Cole