Siege and isolation within and outside of prisons is the current strategy of the fascist, political Islamist regime in Turkey. The labor left movement has to put forward a united response against these measures. The response of the laboring left movement against this fascist attack of siege, oppression and subjugation must be united. It is an urgency to organizeand realize actions of solidarity and engagement.
Democratic-revolutionary institutions standing in solidarity with the prisons must amplify their actions.
As the regime staunchly maintains its cruel method isolation, the prisons of colonial fascism continue to be places of cruelty and death. Reports of sick prisoners dying in confinement are mounting. Those with serious health complications are kept in jail until death– murdered by the fascist regime, in an act of public revenge. In conditions where formal execution is not implemented, systemic neglect of sick convicts serves a an alternative. Hundreds are facing death, being denied the right to receive treatment for [various] reasons. Examinations, if at all, are only allowed under the condition that the detainee is handcuffed.
There seems to be no end to the torture and violence carried out in the prisons of the fascist Turkish state. Strip search assaults at prison entrances or upon return from a lawyer’s meeting, lynching attempts during cell raids, torture in sponge cells, physical attacks in vehicles and in custody, sexual harassment, threats and insults have long been established as systematic practices. Illegal interrogations by the MİT (Millî İstihbarat Teşkilatı— National Intelligence Organization), spying, forced confessions are routine across Turkish jailhouses. The release of political prisoners who have completed their sentence is prevented. Relying on the new execution law that came into force in 2020, the Administration and Observation Boards of the institutions prolong the sentence of prisoners who have earned the right to be released and keep them under detention for additional months. Restrictions and bans on books, magazines, newspapers and letter exchanges are also part of the violent practices of the isolation method.
The colonial fascist Turkish state is scrambling for a way to enforce capitulation. Before, the introduction of the F–Type isolation prison fulfilled this purpose, today the state tries to do this by opening even more such prisons and introducing isolation policies. Since 2016, concepts of isolation in prisons on the basis of legal, spatial and de facto policies have been developed. The fascists did not hesitate to make use of every opportunity to incarcerate revolutionaries during this process.
In 2020, the rights of all political prisoners were suspended under the conditions of the pandemic, creating the basis for expanding the tyrannical practice of solitary confinement. The cruelty of isolation was extraordinarily aggravated amidst the global health crisis. The regime took the given conditions of the pandemic, the contact–regulations and quarantine rules, an turned them into fascist achievements by implementing changes into the Penal Execution Law.
In the post-pandemic period, Y– and S–Type isolation prisons were put into operation on basis of these both legal and de facto changes.
The prisons are designed to impose a stronger degree of isolation. The regime has gradually been transferring prisoners from F-Type, where three people are kept in one isolation cell, to S– or Y–Type single-confinement facilities. Its aim is to fragment and atomize the given organized revolutionary will. In its essence, it serves as torture method of the fascist oppression machine, the goal being to the enforcement of discipline, moderation and submission. As part of this process, the İmralı isolation system is being developed to be applied on all political prisoners.
A primary and distinctive target of this war waged by the colonialist fascist Turkish state against the Kurdish people is undoubtedly the captive Kurdish people’s leader Abdullah Öcalan. The İmralıpolicy is the embodiment of the so-called ‘strategy of collapse’, a concept of colonial warfare used by the Erdoğan–regime. The absolute isolation enforced on the prison island constitutes a key aspect of this. For nearly three years, the İmralısystem has been maintained with an iron fist, steadily fastening the the cruelty of isolation. By way of solitary confinement, Öcalan and his four comrades, are being systematically stripped of all their social, political and legal rights. Öcalan is not allowed to meet with family, lawyers or guardians. His connection to both the social and political world has been cut off entirely. These measures are being justified as disciplinary punishments.
İmralıserves a the heaviest, most reckless and most arbitrary example of the fascist isolation policy. The torture method of total isolation applied within its compounds is being carried to Y– and S–Type prisons, especially in the case of those sentenced to life. Y– and S–Type prisons are being transformed into descendants of İmralı.
Despite all the deprivations, intensified isolation and oppression, political prisoners keep their principles of organization, discipline, productivity and community alive and continue the struggle with a clear revolutionary identity that challenges fascism. By isolating the most determined, conscious, militant components of our people, those who are vanguards and pioneers of their cause, the colonialist fascist regime tries revoke the working class and the oppressed of its leading figures and to destroy the revolutionary capacity of our people.
Revolutionary prisoners will not submit to fascist repression within prisons, neither in the past, nor today. They stand against fascism with resistance, sacrificing their lives in prison cells. They provide the most meaningful response to the ongoing fascist liquidationist strategy of siege, oppression and subjugation.
It shows us that revolutionary organization is a condition of existence itself, even in the difficult conditions of captivity.
During this current political conjuncture, prisoners from the Kurdish liberation movement have begun, once again, to protest against the cruelty and inhumanity of the isolation prisons by entering hunger strikes. This resistance is directed against the aforementioned ‘strategy of collapse’ and the politics of the fascist Erdoğan regime, that has set its objective to isolate the Kurdish struggle by isolating its leading figure.
The struggle within prisons has played a key role in resistance and recovery for our people in every period. The open and frontal resistance of political prisoners against fascist oppression, with their spirit of self–sacrifice and determination, has aroused and organized the hope, resistance and courage of the oppressed and continues to do so. We know that the absolute isolation of İmralıwas broken several times before, under the leadership of prison–resistance, due to which Öcalan was able to use his suspended legal rights.
On the 23rd anniversary of the 19–22 December prison massacre, we find ourselves in a period of struggle where the cruelty of isolation continues to exist with all its violence and a new general resistance against the absolute isolation of İmralıis emerging. Once again, the fire of prison resistance becomes the resilient breath of our revolutionary fight. At this moment, a number of current revolutionary tasks are listed before our labor left movement, and especially revolutionary socialists, and are waiting to be put into political practice. Clearly, breaking the absolute isolation of İmralımeans breaking the fascist siege and gaining a new ground for struggle. In this sense, the resistance raised by the political prisoner group of the Kurdish freedom movement from prisons cannot be considered as a pure prison resistance. Resistance against isolation is a unique way and form of general and united popular resistance.
Siege and isolation within and outside of prisons is the current strategy of the fascist, political Islamist regime in Turkey. The labor left movement has to put forward a united response against these measures. The response of the laboring left movement against this fascist attack of siege, oppression and subjugation must be united. It is an urgency to organize and realize actions of solidarity and engagement. Democratic-revolutionary institutions standing in solidarity with the prisons must amplify their actions. It is our task to stand side by side with the Justice Watch actions, organized by the families of political prisoners, to protest and be the voice of those being silenced behind bars.
As communists we have the revolutionary responsibility, alongside the working left, to stand up against the isolation policies in İmralıand beyond and take action.
It is on is to build a barricade of resistance against executions, immolation and publication bans.
The struggle against fascist oppression, under which seriously ill prisoners are held hostage and murdered, is bound to arise. Democratic reactions and actions against the regime must be spread onto the streets, among the masses. The general resistance in the prison, led by political prisoners of the Kurdish liberation movement and supported by their Communist inmates, and the pioneering actions of the solidarity front outside demand to be supported. The prisons’ call for resistance is voiced in the slogans “End the absolute isolation in İmralı”, “End the isolation in F-, Y-, S-Type prisons”, “Free all sick political prisoners”, “Be a voice for the resistance in prisons, stop the isolation”, “Freedom for political prisoners”. Their demands are set to strengthen the struggle.
Now is the time to show solidarity with prisoners in every aspect, to break the isolation and blockade, both inside and outside.
*Editorial of the 146th issue of ATILIM newspaper, Voice of the Working Class and the Oppressed, dated December 15.