Eylem Daş/JINHA

ISTANBUL –A state prosecutor has opened a case against 47 antiwar women who were brutally arrested by police when attempting to protest attacks on Kobanê.

During the start of Daesh's brutal attacks on Kobanê, 47 women from the Women's Initiative Against War wanted to hold a solidarity action at Istanbul's Atatürk International Airport on October 9^th. There, a team of 200 riot police brutally arrested them. Now, not the police but the women are being charged.

The women are being charged with resisting arrest and refusing to disperse—although women were attacked as soon as they entered the airport, before they could even open their banner. The police kicked the women, pulled them by their hair and dragged them across the floor without making any announcement to disperse.

Almost all 47 women were wounded in the attack, says the report. One woman had to have surgery for the torn meniscus and ligaments in her knee. She spent several months housebound due to her injury.

"As we all know, the AKP government supported ISIS in a number of ways, especially in their attack on Kobanê," said the women's lawyer, PerihanMeşeli.The state prosecutor opened a case against the anti-war women before women's statements about the incident were even received.

Perihan stressed that the right to assemble and the right to free expressionare guaranteed by Turkey's constitution. The women did not even get to attempt to exercise this right before police and private security attacked them, she said.

In 2012, a court in Turkey declared that demonstrations in airports were not permitted, but this decision never passed into law.

The 47 women's first hearing is scheduled for September 8.

(fk/cm)