ANKARA - It has been revealed that PKK Leader Abdullah Öcalan was given a disciplinary penalty for chatting with other prisoners Ömer Hayri Konar, Veysi Aktaş and Hamili Yıldırım after sports activities on November 18, 2021.

 

There has been no news for 20 months from PKK Leader Abdullah Öcalan, who is being held under heavy isolation conditions in İmralı Type F High Security Prison. Applications made by the family and lawyers to the Bursa Execution Judgeship and the Imrali Prison Directorate are either rejected on the grounds of "disciplinary" penalties or left unanswered. Applications by lawyers to the Ministry of Justice, the General Directorate of Prisons and Detention Houses, and the Human Rights Department of the Ministry of Justice were not responded to.

 

Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) deputies Fatma Kurtulan and Hüseyin Kaçmaz to visit İmralı High Security Type F Prison, where PKK Leader Abdullah Öcalan and Ömer Hayri Konar, Hamili Yıldırım and Veysi Aktaş are held under severe isolation conditions on December 2, 2021. They applied to the Parliamentary Human Rights Commission, of which they are members.

 

In the response given by the Parliamentary Human Rights Commission, it was revealed that PKK Leader Abdullah Öcalan was banned from speaking  on the grounds that he had "chatted" after sports activities. Abdullah Öcalan was given a three-month disciplinary penalty for chatting with other prisoners Hamili Yıldırım, Veysi Aktaş and Ömer Hayri Konar in İmralı on November 18, 2021 after sports activities. This sentence was approved on November 23, and the reason was given for the ban on lawyers.

 

In the application made, it was stated that there was no news from PKK Leader Abdullah Öcalan after the interrupted phone call he made with his brother on March 25, 2021, “Families who have not heard from their relatives since then stated that they are worried about their relatives' health conditions and even their lives, and their lawyers have applied to our Commission with a request to intervene. So much so that the families also visited our parliamentary group and expressed their concerns here as well. It is essential that our Commission visit Imrali Prison in order to protect the right of communication of families and prisoners, their right to receive information, to address the concerns of families and to eliminate violations of rights."

 

The Parliamentary Human Rights Investigation Committee responded to HDP's application on June 16, 2022, two months later, with the letter of the General Directorate of Prisons and Detention Houses of the Ministry of Justice, dated  March 22, 2022.

 

CHAT WAS PROHIBITED IN IMRALI

 

In the response, it was revealed that Abdullah Öcalan was given a three-month disciplinary penalty for chatting with other prisoners Ömer Hayri Konar, Veysi Aktaş and Hamili Yıldırım, who were in İmralı on November 18, 2021, after sports activities. The response included the following information regarding disciplinary action: “…in the action that is not in accordance with the activity plan, in which the above-mentioned people were taken to the badminton activity on 18.11.2021, and within the framework of the rehabilitation and training programs of the convicts, the activity, which was organized for 1 hour as training, sports, social and cultural activities, was converted into a chat activity with other convicts participating in the sports activity during the remaining period. Upon the detection of their presence, a disciplinary investigation was initiated against those mentioned, and with the decision of the Institution Disciplinary Board dated 23.11.2021 and numbered 2021/4, it was decided that they were punished with a disciplinary penalty of 'deprivation of visitors for 3 months'."