Weekly Report 31 August-07 September 2015

Kurdistan Diary

• Special operation police teams attacked the neighborhoods of Esentepe and Esenyurt in Yüksekova district of Hakkari  at night, Auguts 31. A youth named Ali Kaval lost his life as police opened random fire from armored vehicles.
• HDP Şırnak deputy Ferhat Encü said people in Silopi faced the possibility of being shot even when went go out to buy bread as snipers have been positioned on the roofs of governor’s office, police station and military buildings. (August 31)
• Hakkari co-mayor Dilek Hatipoğlu and Edremit co-mayor Rojbin Sevil Çetin had been sent to Closed Women’s Prison in Turkish capital Ankara. (August 31)
• Head of Amed Bar Association, Tahir Elçi, released the report prepared by a bar delegation assigned to investigate the clashes that took place in Cizre district of Şırnak on August 27. According to the report health worker Eyüp Ergen (30), DEDAŞ (Dicle Electricity Distribution Corporation) officer Mesut Sanrı (30), Emin Yanaş (10) were killed by snipers on the roofs of governor’s office, police station and military buildings while the cause of death of 7 years old Baran Çağlı would be clarified by the report to be prepared by Istanbul Forensic Institution. (August 31)
• Three foreign journalists, Vice News reporter Jake Hanrahan, cameraman Philip Pendlebury, and their translator  who were detained in Sur district of Amed on August 27 sent to a prison in the southern province of Adana on September 2. As reported on 7th of September, journalists got deported.
• Co-mayor of Mardin’s Nusaybin district municipality, Sara Kaya, and DBP Nusaybin district co-chair Zinnet Alğan who were remanded in custody on September 1, were exiled to Sincan Women’s Prison in Ankara on  2^nd of September. Political genocide operations continue on daily basis in Northern Kurdistan and other cities of Turkey targeting Kurdish Movement and leftists.
• Throughout the week HPG reported that the bombardments of Turkish troops against guerrilla areas and the reconnaissance flights by Turkish unmanned aerial vehicles continued.
• After guerrilla launched attack on “Martyr Nahit Bulut” police station in Dersim city on 4th of September, police forces started opening random fire around the area. Guerilla Rıdvan İpek died during operations while guerrilla Baran Çetinkaya who had suffered a critical injury lost his life 2 days later. Police and special operation teams were deployed on many streets across the city, entrance to which has been prohibited by security forces.  Four civilians had been wounded during police’s random fire. Among them, Ayten Gülhan (32) lost her life at Dersim State Hospital on 5th of September.
• In Northern Kurdistan local people ditch in order to prevent police and military to enter the neighborhoods. On 4th of September, police forces entered Yenişehir neighborhood of Mardin’s Nusaybin with diggers and armored vehicles to fill the trenches.  Lokman Süre was heavily wounded as a result of  police fire on residents at random while filling the trenches. Süre lost his life in the hospital.

• Cizre district of Şırnak witnessed a heavy crackdown by military and police forces since the 4th of September evening following a curfew and deployment of thousands of special operation teams. While this has become typical method of state terror: declaring curfew, closing the entrances of city, attacking neighborhoods, blocking roads, blockading hospitals. On the third day of curfew in Cizre, fire opened from armored police vehicles in Nur neighborhood left a 19-year-old youth Sait Çağdavul dead. The body of the youth was taken to the mosque since civilians were denied access to hospital under the blockade of security forces. 13-year-old Cemile Çağırga lost her life as a result of fire opened from an armored vehicle in Cudi neighborhood. The body of Çağırga, like many others killed in attacks by security forces, is being held in a house due to the ongoing police blockade. Osman Çağlı (18) who suffered a critical injury as a result of fire opened by snipers in Cudi neighborhood died of blood lose on 7th of September after he was denied access to hospital by police. As of the date of September 7 (4th day of clashes) attacks of police&military directed at Cizre continue. With Çağlı the number of people who lost their lives reached up to 7 in only last 4 days.

• Special operation teams blockaded Amed’s central Sur district on 5th of September opening fire on people at random in Hasırlı neighborhood and leaving 39 year-old woman by the name of Saliha Opçin seriously wounded. Special operation teams’ operations in the neighborhoods of Fatihpaşa and Hasırlı with heavy weapons took place on the night of September 5.  A rocket attack against an armored police vehicle left two policemen dead and three others wounded in Hasırlı neighborhood of Sur district. JINHA (Women’s News Agency) reporter Şehriban Aslan was injured as a result of fire opened by special operation teams in Sur district on the 6th of September.

• Dutch journalist Frederike Geerdink working  for Dutch dailies Het Parool and De Groene Amsterdammer  was taken into custody by police in Amed on the night of September 5. Geerdink has been working in Turkey and living in Amed(Diyarbakır) since 2006.

• A 35 days old baby by the name of Muhammed Tahir Yaramış fell sick in Nur neighborhood of Şırnak’s Cizre district and lost his life later due to the blockade by police forces that didn’t allow the access of ambulances into the neighborhood. Police do not allow the people to take and bury the bodies of 4 civilians who lost their lives in the attacks by security force.
• HPG Press Office reported in a written statement that guerrillas conducted an action against Turkish soldiers in Geliyê Doskî (Dağlıca) area in Hakkari’s Gever (Yüksekova) district at afternoon, September 6. According to HPG, 31 soldiers including staff colonel  İlker Çelikcan were killed and a number of weapons were seized in the action. Despite HPG statements, due to the first official announcements 19 soldiers lost their lives. President Tayyip Erdoğan’s initial reaction concerning the clash was to declare the reason of this total warfare as AKP’s missing majority of 400 deputies in the recent elections in order to secure the approval of his new presidency status in the parliament.  All around Turkey democratic forces protest against civilian deaths in Northern Kurdistan provinces as well as soldier deaths, all victims of AKP’s aggressive wars to stay in power.
• Roboski families gathered together upon the graves of their beloved ones who lost their lives as a result of bombing attack of Turkish Military warplanes in 2011. President of Roboski Association Veli Encü stated that state wanted to close the case and protect the perpetrators.

Turkey Diary

• Murderer police officer Ahmet Şahbaz who executed unarmed Ethem Sarısülük by gunshot in the head during Gezi protests in Ankara, has been be evacuated. (September 3)

• The bill authorizing the government for cross-border operations and sending troops out to Iraq and Syria got through parliament with affirmative votes of  AKP, CHP and MHP. HDP was the only party who voted against the bill.
• Protester Mehmet Özdemir was shot to death by police when police attacked the protests in Tarsus district of Mersin. (August 6)

• It is the 60th anniversary of reactionist, racist attacks which took place in 6-7 September  in 1955 sparked by the so called attack on Atatürk’s house in Salonica, Greece. During the racist attacks targeting minorities in İstanbul and İzmir 16 Greeks were murdered, tens were injured, 73 Greek churches, 1 synagogue, 8 holy springs of orthodox greeks, 2 monasteries and 5,538 estates among which 3,584 owned by Greeks were ravaged. Due to some sources  50 non-muslim  women were raped while some sources claim this number to be 200.

Eco Diary

• After the massive flood in Hopa, it is revealed that sewage has been discharge into Sundura rivulet raising concerns about public health after flood.

• Pollution in Büyük Menderes River used in irrigation of agricultural lands has reached up to critical levels. Specialists warn that water contain heavy metals threatening health.

Workers’ Diary

• ISIG (Council of Worker Health&Security) reported that 40 workers lost their lives in the first six days of September. Due to the report 158 workers lost their lives in workplace murders in the month of August. The sectors with highest rates in workplace murders are construction, agriculture and transportation sectors. In 2015, as of the end of August, the number of workers who lost their lives in the first 8 months of the year has reached up to 1138.

Eylül ayının ilk altı gününde en az '40 işçi' iş cinayetlerinde yaşamını yitirdi… – İSİG Meclisi pic.twitter.com/fsgnObTl3b

— İSİG Meclisi (@guvenlicalisma) September 7, 2015

• In Amasra, 500 workers working in mines of HEMA Company went on strike due to the failure of negotiations between the management and GMİS(General Trade Union of Mine Workers)concerning joint agreement.
• Combatant, progressive wing in Turkish Labour Union, Petroleum Union management is replaced by AKP supportive team which is bad news for class struggle.

Prisons Diary

• In last 14 days 211 prisoners including democratically elected local co-presidents of Kurdish provinces have been exiled to cities in West and Black Sea Region.
• As of the date of 7^th of September, approximately 5000 political prisoners have been on hunger strike for 24 days demanding freedom for Abdullah Öcalan, an end to aggresive warfare of state and political genocide operations.

Women diary

• Men have killed 22 women in August. Two women were murdered whilst they were trying to prevent assaults targeting other women. One woman was murdered by her husband whose proximity had been restrained by court order.
• On August 22, Palestinian woman L.B. tried to cross the Syrian-Turkish border with her father and brother. She told Sputnik News that she was raped at the border in the village of Güveççi, in the Hatay province of Turkey by soldiers.
• Women from the Dêrîk region of Rojava who have completed military and ready for self-defense.

35 women from #Rojava communes in #Dêrîk learn to defend their neighborhoods, villages http://t.co/krtfj7OLo5 pic.twitter.com/arZ37Resuf

— JINHA Women's News (@JinhaWomensNews) August 31, 2015

Refugee Diary

• Two boats carrying Syrian refugees headed to Greece have sunk off the coast of Bodrum, Turkey. 11people lost their lives. Photos of Aylan Kurdi’s body came ashore raised public attention concerning refugees crisis, Turkish State’s neglect and journalism. Journalist Nilüfer Demir, who photographed the body of three-year-old refugee Aylan Kurdi spoke as: “There was not a single thing I could do for him. The only thing I could do was to make people hear the cry of that lifeless body on the ground. And I thought, the only way I can do this is by pushing the shutter and taking that photograph.” Aylan and his brother Galip and their mother Rihan Kurdi were laid to rest in Martyr Dicle Cemetery in Kobanê on September, 4.

• Upon the death of refugees ‘Women of Earth’ platform occupied provincial directorate of family and social policies in Mersin. Platform members protested state’s neglect concerning femicides&refugee crisis. They were detained immediately.

Saturday Mothers/People

At the 545th week of the protest of the Saturday Mothers/People AKP’s total warfare policy was protested. Saturday Mothers/People asked what had happened to Hüseyin Morsümbül who had disappeared while in detention in the military coup period known as September 12 era.

isyandan.org