A Turkish teacher who previously underwent extensive cancer treatment is being held in an overcrowded and unsanitary prison ward after being convicted of links to the Gülen movement, raising concerns that the conditions could endanger her health.
Nermin Varol, a former religion teacher at a private school in the Black Sea province of Sinop, was taken into custody on March 5 after the Supreme Court of Appeals upheld her six-year, three-month prison sentence. She is being held at a women’s prison in Ankara, where relatives say her ward regularly houses twice its intended capacity. They described conditions that are unhygienic, adding that some inmates sleep on the floor.
“The risk of the cancer progressing is always there,” a relative said.
Varol was convicted of membership in a terrorist organization in a case linked to the faith-based Gülen movement. According to the TR724 news website, the accusations against Varol relied solely on witness testimony claiming that she organized religious discussion gatherings linked to the Gülen movement.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has targeted followers of the Gülen movement, inspired by the late Muslim cleric Fethullah Gülen, since corruption investigations in December 2013 implicated him as well as some members of his family and inner circle. He dismissed the probes as a Gülenist conspiracy and later designated the movement a terrorist organization in May 2016, intensifying a sweeping crackdown after a coup attempt in July of the same year that he accused Gülen of orchestrating. The movement denies involvement in the coup attempt or any terrorist activity.
Varol was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2016. She later underwent several operations in which her breast, uterus and thyroid were removed due to the risk of metastasis and received chemotherapy before being placed under periodic medical monitoring. According to relatives, she requires medical checkups every six months.
Attempts to secure Varol’s release on medical grounds have so far failed. Turkish law allows courts to suspend sentences for inmates who cannot sustain their lives independently, a threshold relatives say has proven difficult to meet despite medical reports submitted on her behalf.
