Press
In a joint letter to President Biden, 142 US representatives criticize the Turkish government for human rights violations. Biden must therefore take action.
Washington, DC – 142 Democratic and Republican representatives are calling for a joint letter president Joe Biden to take action against the Turkish government. The main reason for this is human rights violations, especially after the coup attempt on 15 July 2016.
“We urge you, President Biden, to prioritize human rights and urge the Turkish government to end its cross-border campaign of repression, unconditionally release political prisoners, and restore the rule of law,” the MPs write. The signatories end their letter with the sentence “Your intervention is critical to upholding the values of democracy and human rights on the world stage.”
US lawmakers denounce Turkey’s human rights abuses
The MPs from the US Congress criticize that the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan wants to silence his critics abroad as well. The US representatives cite the case of former NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom as an example. The Erdogan government tried to silence him “by targeting his family in Turkey, persecuting them and issuing an Interpol arrest warrant and a bounty on him and many others.”
In recent years, the Turkish government has repeatedly abused Interpol to have government critics arrested abroad and then brought to Turkey. FR.de from IPPEN.MEDIA had about the Case of a Berlin German-Kurd reportedwho was arrested in this way while on holiday in Sardinia.
Mass dismissals of civil servants after the coup attempt
The people’s representatives also criticize the mass dismissals of civil servants after the coup attempt. Tens of thousands of civil servants were later arrested because they were terrorists. 90 percent of the media landscape also fell under the control of the Erdogan government and journalists were arrested, with two groups of journalists in particular being particularly persecuted.
Sympathizers of the exiled preacher Fethullah Gülen and Kurdish journalists are disproportionately affected by such reprisals. Long detentions and frequent police raids on newspaper offices are hindering the important work of journalists.
Erdogan has Gülen supporters kidnapped abroad
The kidnapping of Gülen supporters abroad has also been criticized. They were also kidnapped from European countries such as Kosovo and Moldova by the Turkish secret service MIT and taken to Turkey. Many of them were then taken to secret prisons and tortured there. An international team of journalists uncovered the MIT kidnapping program under the name “Black Sites Turkey”.
The situation in Turkish prisons is also one of the points of criticism in the letter to the US President. There are currently 1,605 patients in Turkish prisons, 604 of whom are seriously ill. The US politicians refer to the figures from the Turkish human rights association IHD.
Türkiye ignores ECHR rulings
The Türkiye is also a country that always condemned by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) and often ignores its rulingsThe ECHR had repeatedly ordered the release of cultural promoter Osman Kavala, who has been in prison for six years in connection with the anti-government Gezi protests.
In the case of the prominent Kurdish politician and former co-chair of the opposition HDP, Selahattin Demirtas, Erdogan and his ruling party are also ignoring AKP International law. The ECHR had also criticized the proceedings in the past and demanded Demirtas’ release. Demirtas, who has been imprisoned since 2016, was instead sentenced to more than 40 years in prison in May. Kavala was sentenced to life imprisonment in April 2022.
European Parliament rapporteur on Turkey calls justice system “dysfunctional”
The European Parliament’s Turkey rapporteur, Nacho Sánchez Amor, also repeatedly criticizes Turkey for its massive human rights violations. After the Demirtas verdict, Amor had a clear message for Ankara. “Such actions and a dysfunctional judicial system undermine Turkey’s credibility. The price? No company can fully trust an environment in which the judiciary is constantly being questioned,” the expert wrote on X.
Erdogan wanted to prevent letter to Biden with the help of lobby organizations
NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom, a staunch supporter of the Gülen movement, commented on the letter in a video message on X. According to the statement, the Turkish Foreign Ministry tried to prevent the letter from being sent. Erdogan himself gave the order to do so.
“The letter you see in my hand is the letter that the Foreign Ministry of the Republic of Turkey has been trying to get its hands on for weeks. The letter you see in my hand is the letter that the Republic of Turkey has tried to stop by spending millions of dollars every year to American lobbying companies,” says the former basketball professional. Many ministers and MPs in Turkey have called the USA to put pressure on the US MPs. (erpe)
#Congress #members #demand #Biden #action #Erdogan