Newsletter

Dear Sir or Madam,
Please find below our monthly newsletter.
Kind regards 

Prof. Kariane Westrheim 

Chairperson 

Council of Europe – Execution of ECHR Judgments in the Kavala Case The Council of Europe’s Ministers Committee deeply regret Osman Kavala’s ongoing detention despite clear judgment & urge Turkey to eliminate all negative consequences of charges against applicant, in particular by ensuring his immediate release 
https://search.coe.int/cm/Pages/result_details.aspx?ObjectID=0900001680a8319f

Council of Europe – Execution of ECHR Judgments in the Demirtaş Case The Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers underline urgent need for Constitutional Court to conclude examination of Selahattin Demirtas’ ongoing detention asap with full regard to ECHR reasoning under Art 18 violation & meantime strongly urge again his immediate release 
https://search.coe.int/cm/Pages/result_details.aspx?ObjectID=0900001680a83184

Report on human rights violations for the month of August by CHP MP Sezgin Tanrıkulu

– 186 workers died on the job 

– 38 women died in femicides 

– 7 people died in prisons
https://www.duvarenglish.com/report-on-rights-violations-in-turkey-in-august-seven-people-died-in-prisons-news-61334

Report on Violations of Press The Media Freedom Rapid Response, a group monitoring violations of press freedom in European Union member states and candidate countries, has published its first semi-annual report of the year
https://m.bianet.org/5/100/267277-mfrr-legal-persecution-most-pervasive-threat-against-journalism-in-turkiye

EUTCC Commentaries #20:Promoting Terror by the Turkish StateThe Case of the Turkistan Islamic Partyby Seevan Saeed, Shaanxi Normal University When it comes to the issue of terror and terrorism, the Turkish State very comfortably labels whoever is not in line with Turkey’s interest and strategy. Moreover, almost all Western states are outspokenly suggesting that they do understand Turkish concern about its national security and its struggle for counter terrorism actions. However, the other side of the coin is very rarely looked at. This article argues that the Turkish State is promoting terror through supporting the Islamist fundamentalist organisations inside and outside Turkey. The aid and support of the Turkistan Islamic party is one of the cases that Turkey has its hand in it.
http://eutcc.net/?p=1161

EU Turkey Civic Commission
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Dear Sir or Madam,
Please find below our monthly newsletter.
Kind regards Prof. Kariane Westrheim 

EUTCC Commentaries #18: Turkish Racism Against Kurds: Colonial Violence, Racist Slurs and Mob Attacks by Güllistan Yarkın, Independent Researcher, Istanbul
This commentary focuses on how the Turkish state facilitates military urbanism as revanchist and racialized mechanisms of collective punishment to suppress grassroots mobilization, oppositional politics.  
http://eutcc.net/?p=1122

Report by Yazidi Justice Committee human rights lawyersTurkey should face charges in front of the international court of justice for being complicit in acts of genocide against the Yazidi people, while Syria & Iraq failed in their duty to prevent the killings
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2022/jul/05/turkey-should-face-international-court-over-yazidi-genocide-report-says-helena-kennedy?utm_term=Autofeed&CMP=twt_gu&utm_medium&utm_source=Twitter#Echobox=1657059071

Bianet Male Violence Monitor July 2022 Report– 28 women killed – 12 women subjected to violence- 38 women forced to sex work 
https://m.bianet.org/english/diger/265352-men-killed-28-women-in-july

ECHR judgment in the case Kavala v. Türkiye: joint statement by the Council of Europe leadersWe urge Türkiye, as a Party to the Convention, to take all necessary steps to implement the judgment. This matter will remain under the supervision of the Committee of Ministers until the judgment is fully implemented.
https://www.coe.int/en/web/portal/-/echr-judgment-in-the-case-kavala-v-turkiye-joint-statement-by-the-council-of-europe-leaders

Statement by HDP Central Executive Board regarding the massacre carried out by the Turkish Armed Forces in Zakho 8 Arab tourists were killed and 17 injured in a Turkish rocket attack on a village in Zaxo in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, according to the district governor. 
https://hdpeurope.eu/2022/07/hdp-the-turkish-government-is-politically-and-legally-responsible-for-the-massacre-in-zakho/

EU Turkey Civic Commission
www.eutcc.net
Twitter: @EUTCC1
Facebook: Eu Turkey Civic Commission

Dear Sir or Madam,
Please find below our monthly newsletter. 
Kind regards Kariane Westrheim EUTCC Chairperson 

Statement by S&D on the progress report prepared by MEP Nacho Sánchez Amor, the European Parliament’s rapporteur on Turkey The S&D urges Ankara to end its authoritarian drift and stop accommodating Russia. Turkey should instead align with the EU sanctions imposed against the Kremlin. 
https://www.socialistsanddemocrats.eu/newsroom/no-grounds-resuming-accession-negotiations-ankara

Press conference on the situation of political prisoners in Turkey in the Geneva Press clubSpeakers: Lawyers for Freedom R. Ergül, Asrın Law Office R. Sarıca & Permanent Representative to the UN, American Association of Jurists G. Fattorini 
https://twitter.com/genevapressclub/status/1536982517571407873?t=oat5n_8ZcbKBpTKq4vb0kg&s=19

Eren Keskin, co-chair of Human Rights Association on paramilitary forces in the Kurdish majority areas of Turkey“These paramilitary structures are free to do anything while civil society considered to be terrorists.” 
http://mezopotamyaajansi35.com/en/ALL-NEWS/content/view/175192

Briefing by World Organisation Against Torture Authorities in Turkey use anti-terror laws as a weapon against human rights work, criminalizing thousands of peaceful activists. 
https://www.omct.org/en/resources/reports/turkey-the-instrumentalization-of-the-counter-terrorism-legislation-and-policies-and-their-impact-on-hrds

World Refugee DayThe number of refugees around the world has surpassed 100 million. On World Refugee Day, the EUTCC remains committed to democratisation in the Middle East and Turkey. A political solution to the Kurdish question is an essential factor here. 

EU Turkey Civic Commission
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Twitter: @EUTCC1
Facebook: Eu Turkey Civic Commission

Dear Sir or Madam,
Please find below our monthly newsletter. 
Kind regards Kariane Westrheim EUTCC Chairperson 

Turkey Report by EP Committee on Foreign Affairs MEPs 

In spite of Turkey’s repeated declarations on the objective of EU accession, over the past two years the country has consistently gone back on its commitments in relation to the accession process, warn EP Committee on Foreign Affairs MEPs in their 2021 report on Turkey.
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20220509IPR29116/turkey-report-persistently-further-from-eu-values-and-standards

Statement by HDP Foreign Affairs Spokespersons Feleknas Uca and Hişyar Özsoy on the prison sentence against CHP İstanbul Provincial Chair Canan Kaftancıoğlu Approval of the prison sentences against CHP İstanbul Provincial Chair Canan Kaftancıoğlu should be seen as another crackdown on government opposition ahead of the presidential and parliamentary elections. 
https://hdp.org.tr/en/turkish-supreme-court-upholds-prison-sentence-against-opposition-politician-ms-canan-kaftancioglu/16399/

Statement by HDP Women’s Assembly “As we have always stated, HDP is a women’s party. The government, well aware of this fact, blatantly attacks not only a political party but also the will of women.”
https://hdp.org.tr/en/the-akp-mhp-government-blatantly-attacks-not-only-hdp-but-also-women-s-will/16378/

Bianet Male Violence Monitoring Report May 2022Men inflicted violence on at least 64 women, abused at least 22 girls and boys, harassed at least 11 women, and forced 65 women to do sex work.
https://m.bianet.org/english/diger/262793-men-kill-32-women-in-may

Resolution by the European Parliament on the verdict in the Gezi Case and Osman Kavala’s life sentence 
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/RC-9-2022-0227_EN.html

EUTCC Commentaries #17Turkey’s Military Urbanism and Neocolonial Architecture in Kurdish Cities
by Diren Taş, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich – Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology
Executive Summary: This commentary focuses on how the Turkish state facilitates military urbanism as revanchist and racialized mechanisms of collective punishment to suppress grassroots mobilization, oppositional politics, and resistance in Kurdish cities. Based on an ethnographic case study in Sur, Diyarbakır, it shows how neocolonial urban policies are employed to annihilate, displace, and dispossess localities while replacing them with standardized, bordered, and financialized architectures of state security and control. Mass scale destructions, militarized policies, and coercive restructuring in Kurdish cities reveal the state’s emergent spatial strategy to recolonize the region at the urban level. The state dominates, frames, and reconfigures Kurdish urbanities so as to eliminate alternatives, opposition, and challenges to its existing and deepening hegemony. 
https://journals.tplondon.com/com/article/view/2100
EU Turkey Civic Commission
www.eutcc.net
Twitter: @EUTCC1
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Dear Sir or Madam, 
please find below our monthly newsletter. 

Kind regards 
Prof. Kariane Westrheim Chairperson 

…

Statement on Turkey’s cross-boarder military offensive Turkey launched another large-scale military offensive in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq on the evening of 17 April. Attacks on northern Syria also continue. The war in Ukraine is both a reminder and a call to outlaw and combat war crimes and violations of international law immediately and everywhere. We strongly condemn Turkey’s cross-border military offensive. The international community is called upon to take a clear stand on the side of international law in this war as well and to impose appropriate sanctions immediately. 
http://eutcc.net/?p=1063

Bianet Male Violence Monitor April 2022 Report- 29 women killed – 52 women subjected to violence- 2 women raped- 38 women forced to sex work 
https://m.bianet.org/english/women/261319-men-kill-29-women-in-april

World Press Freedom Day Press freedom is under pressure in every part of the world. However, democracy needs a free and critical press. Therefore the EUTCC remains also committed to the struggle for press freedom. 

EUTCC Commentaries #16: Environmental Racism and Resistance in Kurdistanby Pınar Dinç, Lund University Environmental degradation is identified as a key factor that threatens the future of life on Earth, but such generalised reading entails that conceal the uneven effects of environmental degradation. When environmental degradation takes place on the lands of the marginalised groups, it is often overlooked or further justified by hegemonic powers that view these areas as natural resources or hideouts for insurgent groups that need to be drained. The embedded prejudice and discrimination against the internal others are often inflamed through the media and followed by the dominant society. This commentary addresses this issue of differential significance attributed to environmental degradation in Kurdistan and discusses how the concept of ecological racism may help uncovering this variance. In doing so, this piece covers the existing literature about conflict and environment nexus in Kurdistan, and suggests ways forward to advance knowledge and work towards political and ecological justice. 
https://journals.tplondon.com/com/article/view/2189

International Worker’s DayThe EUTCC sends its appreciation & respect on the International Workers Day to workers of every field all over the world. It is time to remember & celebrate the achievements of labor organizations & social movements whose efforts & struggles have led to a more dignified working life for millions of workers. Let us join forces and unite in the work of making the world a place where there is justice and dignity for all. 

www.eutcc.net
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