'Islamist Dictatorship' Turkey Systematically Jails Women In Persecution Of Critics. HT:
stockholmcf.org.
As part of escalating crackdown on dissent and criticism which landed almost 50,000 people in jail in the last six months alone, Turkish government has aggressively started to persecute women who already bear the brunt of the unprecedented witch-hunt campaign by the country’s Islamist rulers.
A woman got detained right after the delivery of her baby in hospital while another woman was jailed as she was visiting imprisoned husband, leaving her kids stranded in a parking lot in a car under the care of elder brother. A woman who lost sanity under torture in police detention was thrown back to prison despite diagnosis while a woman was jailed because her husband, a journalist, remained at large. The government jailed wives of businessman who are seen supporting the opposition to Turkey’s autocratic President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as the government seized all their business and personal assets.
Everyday dozens of women get arrested in Turkey on false charges of terror and coup plotting in a systematic persecution campaign launched by the country’s autocratic President Erdoğan who declared a “merciless’ crack down on his critics and opponents. Among those who face harsh treatment in detentions and prisons include mostly women of Gülen movement and Kurdish political movement. Alevis and leftist groups also get their fair share of oppression under the current repressive regime.
The persecution of women who are perceived to be critics of the government has picked up a pace after the failed coup attempt on July 15, 2016 that appears to be staged to set up Erdoğan’s critics for a mass persecution. By targeting especially women, Erdoğan and his partners in the government hopes to break the will of government critics while undermining crucial role of women in supporting the community members, taking care of children who are separated from their jailed fathers.
Erdoğan knows the value of women grassroots networks because he ascended to the power in Turkey partly because of mobilization of conservative and religious women base in Turkey. By exerting pressure on networks sustained in great deal by women in various opposition groups in Turkey, Islamist rulers hope to insure their survival. Since women play essential role both as wives and mothers in keeping the family and on a greater scale the community together, Erdoğan has started directly attacking women in Turkey.
WOMEN TARGETED DURING 2013 GEZİ PROTESTS
WIVES OF CRITICAL JOURNALISTS PERSECUTED
GOVERNMENT ARRESTED BUSINESSMEN’S WIVES
WOMEN HAVE BEEN DETAINED DURING PRISON VISITS
WOMEN HAVE BEEN DETAINED JUST AFTER DELIVERING BABY
WOMAN LOST SANITY BUT KEPT IN JAIL
MOTHERS WHO CARE KIDS WITH DOWN SYNDROME DETAINED
Separated from both her father and mother, Baby Sena’s conditions deteriorated rapidly. She was rushed to the emergency on Jan.23, 2017 and placed in intensive care unit (ICU) at Bağcılar Medilife Hospital. She suffered from serious health troubles including heart, lung and kidney failures. Doctors were able to stabilize her but she had spent 20 days in ICU. Now she is out of the ICU, but her treatment is still underway at the hospital without her parent’s presence.
In another case, a mother of five that included a boy with a Down Syndrome was detained while she was visiting her husband who was jailed on charges of alleged links to the Gülen movement. When she got detained on the spot during the prison visit, five kids including the boy with a Down Syndrome were left stranded in a car in the parking lot of Sincan Prison in Ankara.
The video showing five children left alone in tears in front of the prison after their mother was detained went viral in social media, prompting outcry. “Leaving children alone in such a situation is against the Convention on the Rights of the Child and all related laws. We will follow this issue,” said Mahmut Tanal, a deputy from the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and a member of the Human Rights Commission in the Turkish Parliament.
In the video a child opens the door of a car in the prison parking lot, showing his brothers crying, and says in tears, “We are five brothers, left alone. We have a handicapped brother. I commend those people to God’s punishment.” The boy with a Down Syndrome, sitting in the backseat of the car, appears to be scared. He looks to be at the age of five or six.
The mother, identified with her first name Nagehan, was later transferred to another prison in Tokat, which is hundreds of miles away from her children in Ankara. A fund-raising campaign was launched in the US to help the family and she was later released on TL 50,000 ($14,000) bail.
In both cases, parents were accused of false charges of terror because of their alleged links to the Gülen movement which is inspired by the US-based Turkish Muslim intellectual Fethullah Gülen who has been advocating science education, interfaith and intercultural dialogue and community contribution.
Gülen has been a vocal critic of Turkish government and autocratic President Erdoğan on massive corruption in the government as well as Turkey’s aiding and abetting of radical groups in Syria.
Erdoğan launched an unprecedented persecution against Gülen and his followers in December 2013 right after major corruption probe that incriminated Erdoğan’s family members.
Turkish President vowed to show no mercy towards followers of Gülen and orchestrated the arrest of over 46,000 people in the last six months.
The ruling Islamist leaders labelled the movement as ‘FETÖ’, a terrorist organization, although Gülen, 75-year old cleric, and his followers have never advocated violence but rather remained staunchly opposed to any violence, radicalism and terror in the name of religion. Read the full story here.
