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More Die In Turkish Prison Hunger Strike
ANKARA, April 12 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Three Turkish prisoners who have refused food for months died Thursday, as the government showed no sign of compromise to end the death fasts that have claimed nine lives in less than four weeks during a widespread hunger strike in protest of prison transfers, reports the Washington Post.
Celal Alpay, 28, and Abdullah Bozdag, 26, jailed for membership in outlawed extreme left groups, died in the western city of Izmir, the president of the Human Rights Association (IHD), Husnu Ondul, told AFP.
Tuncay Gunel, a member of another prisoners' organization, died during the night in a hospital in the northwest city of Edirne, the Post adds.
Alpay and Bozdag, who succumbed in hospital, had joined the protest in December.
Between 300 and 400 inmates are on a hunger strike with some 120 of them hospitalized and a dozen in critical condition, according to the human rights association.
Despite the mounting toll, Justice Minister Hikmet Sami Turk signaled that the government was not prepared to intervene, other than to offer medical treatment to hunger strikers if they accept it.
"We regret the deaths. Unfortunately, our repeated calls for an end to this protest have fallen on deaf ears," Turk was quoted by the Anatolia news agency as saying.
"All we can do is to provide treatment to those who want to be treated and constantly monitor their medical condition," Turk added, according to the Post.
All we can do is to provide treatment for those who want. Prison doctors are on duty 24 hours a day," he added.
Last October, hundreds of inmates in jails across Turkey began a fast to protest the introduction of the so-called F-type jails, where cells for three inmates replaced dormitories housing up to 60 people.
The prisoners, backed by a number of civic groups, say the new set-up will leave them more exposed to ill treatment and lead to further social alienation.
Since the strike began, some participants have interrupted the protest at certain times and then restarted it, while others joined several weeks after the action began.
In a bid to break the protest, paramilitary troops raided 20 jails across Turkey last December after mediation efforts by non-governmental efforts failed.
The four-day crackdown resulted in the death of two soldiers and some 30 prisoners, many of whom died by setting themselves on fire.
Asked whether the government could again seek mediation, Turk said: "The inmates demand the closure of the F-type jails, a return to the dormitory system and the abolition of state security courts. There can never be negotiations on these issues."
"From the very beginning we have been saying that these strikes are useless," he added.
In Paris, the International Federation of Human Rights (FIDH) called on the government to open a dialogue with the hunger strikes, their lawyers and representatives.
"Turkish prison authorities cannot in all decency claim that it is bringing its prisons up to European standards when individual cells or cells for two or three inmates are being set up with the aim of ... isolating political prisoners," said the FIDH in a statement.
IHD secretary-general Selahattin Esmer, however, told AFP that the inmates were ready to compromise.
"From lawyers and relatives, we got the impression that they will end the hunger strike if the very tough conditions of isolation are lifted. Currently they are unable to see each other at all," he said.
At present, some 200 inmates were staying in one-man cells and more than 1,000 others in compounds for three people, Esmer said.
Esmer said they had demanded urgent meetings with Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit and President Ahmet Necdet Sezer to discuss a solution to the hunger strikes.
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