Turkey: Treatment of Kurds
Debate between Liz Saville Roberts and Lloyd Russell-Moyle(5 years, 7 months ago)
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Lloyd Russell-Moyle
I totally agree. I should of course mention that my hon. Friend the Member for Newport East (Jessica Morden) is the local Member for Imam Sis. She has been an advocate for his struggle, but cannot be here today because of the death of her agent last week; she is at his funeral. She is following this debate with great interest.
When I was with Imam, I asked him to write down the key demands that he wanted to be raised in Parliament, so I am here today to put Imam’s voice in Hansard as well as to get a response. He wrote to me, saying:
“The hunger strikers are demanding that Turkey ends the isolation of Abdullah Öcalan. Namely, they are demanding that Öcalan be returned access to his lawyers and family. In not doing this Turkey is breaking international law and its own laws. The hunger strikers are also asking that the Council of Europe's Committee for the Prevention of Torture re-open its investigation into the conditions on İmralı Island where Öcalan is being held.”
Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)
I, too, congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing this debate. I am sure he will agree that we have noticed a pattern with Turkey: when there is international attention, Abdullah Öcalan gets something, such as a brief meeting with, say, his lawyer or his brother; then the attention of the world retreats and nothing further happens. It is essential that we keep the pressure on and that we call on the Government to ensure that the response of the Turkish Government is not just a superficial and tokenistic one.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle
I totally agree. Since 2015, little if any access has been granted to Abdullah Öcalan, and it is only because some of the hunger strikes and campaigning that brief interventions have been allowed for relatives to make sure that he is still alive. He has been allowed no access to the external world and his lawyer has had no access in that time.