Rights groups in Turkey accused prison authorities on Friday of unlawfully obstructing the release of political prisoners, claiming that 16 inmates at Istanbul’s Bakırköy Women’s Prison have been denied parole through arbitrary decisions.
According to the Bianet news website, representatives of the Marmara Association for Solidarity with the Families of Prisoners (MATUHAYDER) and the Association of Lawyers for Freedom (ÖHD) held a press conference outside the prison, where they alleged that the parole of political prisoners has been denied by the facility’s Administrative Oversight Board. They warned that these actions reflect a broader pattern of repression in the Turkish penal system.
Administrative oversight boards, established in Turkish prisons in January 2021, have faced criticism for arbitrarily delaying the parole of political prisoners. While Turkish law allows for the early release of convicts who have served a designated portion of their sentences, parole boards were given discretionary powers in granting or refusing this early release.
“Arbitrary disciplinary punishments, transfers far from family and medical neglect — especially for seriously ill inmates — have become normalized in Turkish prisons,” Nurten Karagöz, co-chair of MATUHAYDER, said. She added that complaints regarding such abuses routinely end in impunity, reinforcing a culture of systematic rights violations.
Attorney Elif Taşdöğen of ÖHD called for the abolition of the prison administrative oversight boards, which she said operate without sufficient oversight. “The law is being used as a political tool,” she said.
In the last few years many reports have revealed denial of parole to political prisoners, particularly those imprisoned over Gülen links or pro-Kurdish political engagement, on arbitrary grounds such as “failure to display remorse.
