A 9-month pregnant woman who has been given a six-month suspended prison sentence has revealed the systematic patterns of maltreatment and repression in Turkish jails. Remziye Başkak, who has been released from jail after getting a suspension of execution of penalty for six months, pointed out inhuman and degrading conditions in the Tarsus T-type closed prison in the province of Mersin.
According to a report published by Aktif Haber news portal, the practices of ill-treatment and cruelty have repeatedly included cell confinement, banning in-person jail visits and inmates’ phone calls, and frisking detainees bare-naked.
Speaking of maltreatment and suppression by the prison officers, Başkak said, “a female prisoner and her 6-month baby were put behind bars one week ago had an x-ray as nude,” Başkak added, “a 50-year old mother who was unable to take off her socks was condemned to a 12-day solitary confinement.”
“Everything is at the mercy of security guards in the jail. Either they let you see a doctor, or not. Even healthy individuals suffer under poor conditions. This is much more difficult for patients and pregnant women,” told Başkak.
Despite the fact that Başkak was having difficulty in walking, she was led away in handcuffs to undergo a medical examination. By referring to this occurrence, Başkak stated, “They took away me to the infirmary even though I said guardians not to menace me as I find walking difficult in these conditions. Nonetheless, they put me back to the cell without having a health control.”
Başkak was accused of being member to the outlawed the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), and was convicted of aid and abet in the separatist terrorist organization based upon charges of participating in a funeral of a protestor passing away during staging a protest in 2005 on the basis of the anniversary of handing over Abdullah Öcalan to the Turkish security officers.
Hundreds of women are in pretrial detention in jails across Turkey with their infants, some of them less than six months old, due to a state of emergency declared after a failed coup last year, a BBC Turkish report said on last Friday.
More than 17,000 women in Turkey, many with small children, have been jailed in an unprecedented crackdown and subjected to torture and ill-treatment in detention centers and prisons as part of the government’s systematic campaign of intimidation and persecution of critics and opponents, a report titled “Jailing Women In Turkey: Systematic Campaign of Persecution and Fear” released in April by Stockholm Center for Freedom (SCF) has revealed.
According to another report released by SCF on Mach 22, 2017 with the title of “Suspicious Deaths And Suicides In Turkey” there has been an increase in the number of suicides and suspicious deaths in Turkey, most in Turkish jails and detention centers where a torture and ill-treatment is being practiced.
