Amnesty International called on Turkish authorities to respect and protect the right to peaceful assembly of the Saturday Mothers, on May 27, the group’s 30th anniversary.
The Saturday Mothers are a group of activists seeking the fate of loved ones who disappeared in police custody in the 1980s and ’90s and demanding accountability for the disappearances.
The group had been holding weekly sit-ins at İstanbul’s historic Galatasaray Square since 1995, but their 700th peaceful sit-in on August 25, 2018 was forcibly dispersed by police. They were accused of violating the Law on Meetings and Marches.
Ever since, the Saturday Mothers have been facing restrictions when holding peaceful demonstrations in the square — a space of deep symbolic significance for them — with prosecutors seeking penalties for public vigils organized there.
In its statement Amnesty said for the past five years the group has been unable to exercise their right to peaceful protest.
“These individuals, who seek justice for their missing loved ones, have been forcibly removed from Galatasaray Square, where they used to gather and make their voices heard. The right of the Saturday Mothers and their supporters to assemble is protected under both domestic and international law as part of their freedoms of expression and peaceful assembly and cannot be lawfully banned. On the contrary, authorities are obligated to ensure these rights are upheld and protected,” the group said, appealing to the Turkish Ministry of Interior
Addressing the Ministry of Justice, Amnesty called for an impartial, independent, and effective investigation into allegations of unnecessary and excessive force, as well as ill-treatment by police during the August 25 protest. “Anyone found criminally responsible must be brought to justice through fair trials,” the organization stated.
