A Mockery of Justice

by Sheri Laizer

10 May 1999

"I feel as if I am in an abyss... I don't know if I can bear it much longer," Abdullah Ocalan warned his lawyers visiting Imrali Island prison at the end of April.

After the illegal abduction of the PKK leader from Kenya to Turkey on 15 February 1999, the Turkish authorities promised the world a "fair trial" for their captive. Nearly three months later however, it is evident from the vast catalogue of abuses and the manifest infringements of both Turkish and international law to date that this is clearly not the situation: from the outset Abdullah Ocalan had been judged, condemned and his blood pledged to the masses fanned into hysteria by the unscrupulous state-sponsored media.

Whilst all along it has been fundamentally the Kurdish Cause which is on trial in the person of Mr. Ocalan, the inexorable machinery of Kemalism has systematically ground all due process of law underfoot in the determined march towards the delivery of a guilty verdict and the death sentence. There has never been a presumption of innocence until proven guilty, no right to a defense made of his own free will,  not even the semblance of a "fair trial" for Mr. Ocalan. Indeed, when the death sentence is eventually handed down, whether much of Mr. Ocalan as the world once knew him will still be left standing by that time is today in considerable doubt.

The accused, after nearly 90 days imprisonment - in conditions which themselves constitute an infringement of Turkish law  - was still denied confidential access to counsel. Of the eighty or so Turkish lawyers who had put themselves forward to defend him, the key protagonists had become so public a focus of nationalist wrath that they were virtually in the same boat as their client - hapless scapegoats of a well-oiled political agenda. Lynch mobs greeted their every arrival and departure to and from the prison island of Imrali with attacks, insults and threats of death. The police stood back and allowed them to be beaten. The death threats continued in their homes and workplaces. Vicious phone-calls, abusive and violent letters.

At the opening of the trial at the Ankara State Security Court on 30 April 1999 such attacks continued with such severity that several of Mr. Ocalan's lawyers were in need of medical treatment for injuries sustained in the court. At the time of writing, almost three months on, neither they nor their families enjoy any security of life whatsoever. The situation has indeed become so grave that Ahmet Zeki Okcuoglu, leader of the defense team, called upon the United States as Turkey's mentor (and one who had played so instrumental a role in Mr. Ocalan's capture) to take responsibility for their safety upon itself. Both the Turkish President and the Prime Minister had previously failed to take any preventative action, at the same time, neither refraining from using the media to pre-judge the case, nor insisting on the lawyer's right to neutrality.

And what of Mr. Ocalan? Detained in solitary confinement, his physical and mental health is observed to be plummeting on an ever deepening curve of decline. Aside from restricted visits by his lawyers which are fraught with difficulty (police mock, taunt and abuse the visiting lawyers and subject them to aggressive and invasive body searches), or the infrequent half-hour "visitations" conducted through a glass partition with his siblings, Abdullah Ocalan has been deprived of all contact with the outside world.  The Turkish authorities have permitted him no newspapers, no books (state propaganda aside), no radio, nor to receive virtually any of the hundreds of letters written to him from around the world. In a small area adjacent to his cell he receives only one hour of fresh air a day. The rest of the time he spends alone, shut in, shut off. His sister, Fatma Ocalan and his lawyers reported that by the end of April he had lost almost fifteen kilos. In answers made to lawyer's questions about aspects of his health, Ocalan replied that he was losing his memory, that he could no longer control his feelings, and that he was suffering from weakness, dizziness and palpitations of the heart previously unknown to him. In fact, he had not even been able to get out of bed to see them the day before. He said he felt as if he might fall over at any moment. The interrogation by highly-trained intelligence operatives, the strange monitoring by special doctors and psychiatrists who make no public disclosures about his situation seem to carry on behind closed doors unabated.

As in the first week of his representation after access to counsel had finally been granted after ten days, so too in week eleven did the defense publicly threaten to withdraw from the case on the grounds that proceedings contravened lawful standards. Not only had they been denied permission to bring their case files into the room where they met with Mr. Ocalan in order to prepare his case, but their visits with their client were interrupted and cut short. At all times security personnel were observed to be present and within hearing distance. The lawyers believed that communications with their client were probably being recorded. Client confidentiality was utterly deficient. Despite every attempt by the defense to adhere to procedure, the prosecution had behaved in a way that made a mockery of justice.  Details of the case had been leaked to the media which the prosecution had not disclosed to the defense; they and other public officials constantly made emotive statements against Mr. Ocalan in the media which seriously prejudiced the case; pronouncements had been made on the merits of the case in advance of proceedings; military operatives have been present on Imrali Island from the outset. Personnel responsible to the Chief of Staff had enjoyed unrestricted access and control over Mr. Ocalan's conditions of detention. They sat in on his visits with his lawyers. A special "Crisis Desk" had been set up and accorded responsibility for the handling of the case making it a case unique in Turkish law. At first, when Mr. Ocalan's lawyers tried to access the Crisis Desk they were told that nobody knew where it was. Every obstacle possible had been put in the path of their preparing a defense, officials for the prosecution flaunting procedure at every step of the way. In addition dubious statements attributed to Mr. Ocalan produced in uncertain circumstances were placed in the media that his lawyers had enjoyed no prior knowledge of. What's more, there had been no monitors, doctors, or other professionals able to give independent testimony on any aspect of Mr. Ocalan's condition since the visit of the Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) conducted on the tenth day of the PKK leader's incarceration.

A month later, on 22 March 1999, in a written communication to the Turkish Foreign Ministry, the CPT stressed its concern over Ocalan's psychological health as of  their visit of 25 February. Recommendations that Mr. Ocalan be allowed access to information, to conversation, to improved conditions for exercise etc. were also made but still went ignored. By the end of April, given Mr. Ocalan's marked deterioration, his defense formally reapplied to the CPT to undertake a second visit with the utmost urgency.

The Turkish defense team did however succeed in establishing working links with  international lawyers representing Abdullah Ocalan via the office set up in the name of the Fair Trial Bureau, or Asrin Hukuk Buroso based in Germany. Since the PKK leader's arrival in Italy last November and his desperate attempts to gather an audience in Rome to press for a solution of the Kurdish Question, a number of politicians, human rights and law for a have been pressing for an international hearing of the case of Ocalan vs. Turkey. While the European Court of Human Rights had long since presented a general finding against Turkey over its inclusion of military personnel among the three judges who preside over the State Security Courts (DGM), Amnesty International also published strong reservations concerning the competence, impartiality and independence of the DGMs. Nonetheless, it is this same court system under which Abdullah Ocalan would be tried. Turkey's categorical response was that it would tolerate no meddling in the internal workings of its justice system.

Not withstanding the violations of international law, violations of Turkish law exposed by Ocalan's defense team gave rise to concern over the stubborn refusal by the Turkish ruling elite to allow Ocalan a just hearing - by any standards. It had become plain to all that there was going to be nothing either "fair" or "Open" about this particular trial and that the Turkish authorities continued to believe that a cover-up, relying on their Western friends to keep quiet, would suffice. Although Abdullah Ocalan deserves the designation of a political prisoner, the state is attempting to try him as a common criminal. Moreover, his lawyers having been identified with the client have been similarly criminalized, their words taken at nothing. On his first London visit in April to address a special meeting in one of the House of Commons committee rooms, Selim Okcuoglu confirmed to me that not a single written request sent by Ocalan's lawyers to the prosecution requesting their cooperation, inviting a response to questions, or asking for copies of documents etc. had even been answered. Rather, developments had become known to them afterwards through the media. Selim Okcuoglu, the brother of Ahmet Zeki Okcuoglu who led the team, had arrived in Europe to continue briefing an international audience on Ocalan's case, as well as to be on hand to articulate concerns in an international arena as the trial progressed. Because lawyers' telephones in Turkey were bugged, and given the death threats, the attacks, and the mechanism at work to prevent them from fulfilling what they called "sacred duty of defense," a legal presence outside Turkey was considered essential in order to be able to present the facts of the case free of Turkish censorship and media distortion. It also served to underline the importance of the defense team's desperate efforts attempt to preserve Abdullah Ocalan's integrity and see that he had a legitimate defense. But Selim Okcuoglu could only emphasize the extent to which this was in doubt and Ocalan's life in jeopardy.

The lawyers had, he said, had a frank discussion with Abdullah Ocalan about the prosecution's efforts to see the death penalty handed down. Ocalan recognized that just as prior to his capture, the sole hope of justice being done for the Kurdish cause as much as for himself, lay in initiatives to internationalize debate on the political bases of the case. An important opportunity has been lost hand in hand with his abduction to Turkey.

For so long as Turkey and its Allies managed to criminalize the figure of Ocalan, the underlying political facts were conveniently obscured. Since the Kosovo Crisis had diverted world attention from the headlines the Kurds had seized after suffering the shock of Ocalan's capture resulting in the occupation of Greek Embassies, self-immolations, hungerstrikes to the death in Turkish prisons and the spectacle of ordinary people being lynched in the streets of western Turkey, not even the daily bombings ensuing in Turkey had grabbed a headline. No reporting of substance appeared concerning the atrocious conditions to which Abdullah Ocalan has been subjected, nor of the jeopardy in which his lawyers lived as they struggled to win a "fair hearing". In fact, the Western media had apparently been struck dumb at the very moment when their response was read by the Turkish state as a blessing to continue the psychological torture of Abdullah Ocalan and the brutal suppression of the Kurdish people. Long before the trial got underway, by contrast, the Turkish press was ablaze with headlines reviling Ocalan  as the "baby killer", as the author of the death of some 30,000 people. Ocalan defense lawyer, Ms. Eren Keskin, boldly turned the table saying, "As a person who knows otherwise, I ask who killed Musa Anter, Vedat Aydin, Medet Serhat, Faik Candan and some 10,000 others like them who lost their lives in contra-guerrilla murders? Who was it who killed Zeynep Avci, Remziye Dinc? Who was it who raped little R.K? Who was it who stubbed out cigarettes on the body of two-and-a-half-year old Azat and killed him? I took on this case so that I can ask these very questions. I am sure that all my colleagues also did the same with the same feelings..."

The Kurdish problem in Turkey did not begin with Abdullah Ocalan. It began the moment that the Turkish Republic was proclaimed on the basis of a unitary constitution which denied the existence of any people but the Turkish people. For seventy-five years thereafter lest this be discussed with respect for free speech, laws were put into place to ensure that discussion itself was outlawed. In response to Eren Keskin's assertion of the right to pose such questions, the public prosecutor fast-tracked outstanding cases against her for previous speeches made and articles written calling for peace, brotherhood and democracy in Turkey - all of which are dirty words -  in an effort to silence and put Keskin away even before her client's trial could be concluded. The same pressures applied to several other members of Ocalan's defense team, including both Ahmet Zeki Okcuoglu and his brother Selim. Any statement previously made which called for a settlement of the Kurdish problem is automatically equated under Turkish law with "inciting racial hatred, disseminating racist propaganda and advocating separatism"  - even treason. The outcome is that still, today, the Kurds do not constitutionally exist.

The brilliant lives of Turkey's most sincere democrats are being wasted in Turkish prisons as much as anything because the West does not care to shove Turkey hard enough down the road to practicing democracy because its ambassadors and politicians have become so good at paying lip-service under Western tutelage. As a consequence, since the capture of Abdullah Ocalan, Turkey has become polarized into two camps and the overall political situation has worsened. As the debate centered on Mr. Ocalan and his right to a "fair trial" becomes more heated, so too the chasm between two warring ethnic nationalism yawn wider - one is conveniently subsumed beneath the rhetoric of "terrorism" while the other is allowed to get on with business as usual.

The Kurdish Question in Turkey cannot be solved by the public humiliation of Mr. Ocalan, nor by breaking him nor executing him. The atrocities suffered en masse  by the Kurdish nation for the past 75 years can only begin to be redressed through a negotiated political settlement. This was precisely what Ocalan was after when he sought sanctuary in Europe. If the Turkish wolves are thrown the PKK leader's head tomorrow or the day after in the name of justice the dirty war will be prolonged and the country further divided along ethnic lines. More importantly, it will be difficult for the Kurds to forgive the betrayal of their voice and aspirations once more, as so often before in their history. Given the electoral gains of the extreme right-wing in the 18 April elections, as embodied in the MHP (Nationalist Action Party) there seems no cause for optimism, no hope of reconciliation. While the Kurds of Iraq are toyed with and financially sponsored by the West, the Kurds of Turkey are left at the dubious mercy of Turkish justice.

It is far more than the life of Abdullah Ocalan which is at stake in this trial.