Spokesman Books

The Spokesman 119 Edited by Tony Simpson Ayse Berktay has been locked up in a Turkish prison since October 2011. She and some 200 others are, periodically, before Turkey’s Tribunal with Special Powers as part of the ‘KCK trials’. KCK stands for Kurdish Communities Union, which the Turkish government has labelled a ‘terrorist’ organisation, although the actual basis for this draconian claim is not at all clear. In December 2012, many Kurds, some Turks and various others gathered at the European Parliament in Brussels to consider ‘The Kurdish Question in Turkey’. The conference was sponsored by the United European Left/Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL) political group, with support from Greens and Socialists. It had the sub-title, ‘time to renew the dialogue and resume direct negotiations’. Notwithstanding attempts by the Turkish authorities to restrict Kurdish participation, the conference heard from many speakers of diverse backgrounds and nationalities. They included two prominent K...

PEN Turkey under investigation for ‘insulting the state’ English PEN is concerned that our sister organisation PEN Turkey is facing a preliminary criminal investigation as a result of critical comments about the ongoing prosecution of pianist and composer Fazıl Say . Six members of the PEN Turkey board ( President Tarık Günersel , Vice-President Halil İbrahim Özcan , General Secretary Sabri Kuşkonmaz , Treasurer Tülin Dursun , and board members Zeynep Oral and Mario Levi ) and poet and critic Nihat Ateş (who uploaded the content to the PEN Turkey website) were called in for questioning today by the Istanbul Public Prosecutor’s Office. In June 2012, PEN Turkey’s website carried a statement condemning the prosecution of the musician Fazil Say for religious defamation, in which the centre stated that ‘the international community has been put on alert in the face of fascist developments in Turkey’. Depending on the outcome of the investigation, PEN Turkey board members may face ...

The Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) have prepared this Bulletin , following the end of mass hunger strikes amongst predominantly Kurdish political prisoners in Turkey's prisons, on 18 November. The BDP has 36 members of the Turkish Parliament, elected mainly with the support of Turkey's substantial Kurdish minority, which exceeds 20 million people. Ayse Berktay , long time activist in the Turkish peace movement and a good friend of the Russell Foundation , writes from her prison in Istanbul, where she has been held since October 2011.

Please urge you MP to support Early Day Motion 628 on Kurdish Hunger Strikes ( http://www.parliament.uk/edm/2012-13/628 ) The most recent bulletin from the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) , which has many members amongst the strikers, can be read on the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation website.

Peace in Kurdistan Campaign OPEN LETTER TO TURKISH PRIME MINISTER TAYYIP ERDOGAN Hundreds of Kurdish prisoners are now taking part in a hunger strike which they have declared is to be indefinite. This hunger strike began on 12 September, a not insignificant date in Turkey’s political history, with 63 people, including 13 women, in seven prisons. The numbers have grown rapidly with hundreds more Kurdish political prisoners joining the action and it is reported that 600 prisoners are currently on indefinite hunger strike. The prisoners' demands appear simple and reasonable: the right to education and legal defence in their mother tongue of Kurdish; and the start of direct peace talks to resolve the outstanding conflict by peaceful, constitutional means and with the full participation of imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan. If nothing is done to meet the demands of the hunger strikers, more martyrs will be added to the Kurdish dead and it is feared that the situation could...

A shameful press trial as well for Turkey as for Europe! Doğan Özgüden , Info-Türk Chief Editor, issued the following declaration on September 9, 2012, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the beginning of his journalistic career in Turkey : I began journalism in the Republic of Turkey at the age of 16 years in Izmir on September 9, 1952 It was the first years of the Democrat Party's power having promised a real democratization in the country. However, at that date, 184 personalities of whom many writers or artists of the country were already behind iron bars on charge of belonging to a communist organization. It was followed by the arrest of many journalists or writers whatsoever be their political opinion. A group of Turkish Army's officers overthrew the DP on May 27, 1960, by a military coup with the promise to establish a democratic regime. However they refused to release Kurdish intellectuals already in prison. Moreover, they did not delay to deport many dist...

The Russell Foundation has today received an important appeal from a friend in Turkey who has requested its wide dissemination. Today, in Diyarbakir, Kurdish activists commence a sit-in as part of their long campaign for political rights (see below). Our Turkish friend also urges us all to keep a close eye on developments in Turkey. Appeal to the World Public Mothers for Peace have erected Democratic Solution Tents in all cities of the Kurdish region on 18 March 2011. Kurdish people, embracing the Democratic Solution Tents and keeping watch over them 24 hours a day have directly and most powerfully displayed the determination and the will to put an end to war. Kurdish people have declared their demand and will for peace, democracy and freedom once more in a most splendid fashion to the world in the Newroz demonstrations of 2011. Millions of Kurds holding freedom marches from Newroz fields to Democratic Solution Tents scores of kilometers away have shouted out their democratic demands f...