A Turkish opposition lawmaker has called for a parliamentary investigation into allegations that 12 minors arrested during protests in southeastern Turkey in support of Kurdish women in Syria were subjected to torture and ill-treatment after being transported hundreds of kilometers from their families.
In a petition to the Turkish Parliament’s Human Rights Inquiry Commission, Newroz Uysal Aslan, a lawmaker from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party), said minors reported being beaten while in detention, pressured to sign documents they did not understand in the presence of plainclothes police, threatened and insulted, transported for hours in poorly ventilated vehicles without food and exposed to cigarette smoke while handcuffed.
Upon arrival at a youth detention facility in Hatay, some were allegedly subjected to strip-searches, had their hair cut without consent and were physically assaulted and mocked by officials. The petition also alleges overcrowding, lack of access to adequate clothing and basic necessities, limited outdoor time and minimal psychological support.
Aslan requested that the parliamentary commission conduct an on-site inspection of the Hatay facility and investigate the full detention and transfer process.
The children are among at least 37 minors detained between January 8 and January 27 in the southeastern province of Şırnak following demonstrations supporting Kurdish women and opposing attacks by forces affiliated with the Syrian government in northern Syria. Twelve minors aged 15 to 17 were arrested and transferred to the Hatay facility, roughly 675 to 700 kilometers from their families.
The protests in southeastern Turkey erupted after a video circulated in January from the Syrian city of Raqqa showing a man holding up a woman’s cut braid and claiming it belonged to a fighter from the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The footage spread widely on social media and was followed by demonstrations and online posts, including videos of women braiding their hair. Turkish authorities later opened investigations into some of those posts.
In her assessment Aslan said similar accounts provided by different children indicate the alleged violations may be systematic. She said the claims should be examined under Turkey’s constitution, domestic child protection and criminal procedure laws and international conventions to which Turkey is a party, and called for those responsible to face administrative and judicial proceedings.
