Öykü Dilara Keskin / JINHA

İSTANBUL - With the Turkish state refusing to allow negotiations or even meetings with jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, women human rights activists say this is an ominous sign for peace in Turkey.

Abdullah Öcalan, the leader of the guerrilla group the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), has been jailed on Turkey's isolated İmralı prison island for more than 16 years. It has been nearly four years since he was allowed to meet with his lawyers. Last year, a delegation of politicians and civil society members began to take part in negotiations with the jailed PKK leader, but the delegation has been denied meetings since April 5 of this year. The state has repeatedly told lawyers, the delegation and Öcalan's family that the boat to the island is "under repairs."

Women human rights activists, who have been among the most active in calling for the rejuvenation of the peace process, say that the isolation policy against Abdullah Öcalan is a threat to peace in Turkey and the Middle East. They say that holding the PKK and its leader under unequal conditions undermines the possible of negotiations, which have been frozen for months. They are calling for an end to the isolation policy--and ultimately, for Abdullah Öcalan's freedom from jail.

Meral Çıldır is the vice president of the Human Rights Association of Turkey. She noted that a condition of isolated imprisonment on an island, with no access to lawyers, family or others, constituted a human rights violation on its own. The Human Rights Association, she said, supports Abdullah Öcalan's freedom because his imprisonment constitutes an attack on the Kurdish people in the person of their leader.

Eren Keskin, a human rights lawyer in Turkey and spokesperson for the platform "Freedom for Öcalan for Peace," noted that the prison on İmralı has operated according to the tactics human rights lawyers are familiar with from counter-guerrilla operations in the Kurdish region. She and other lawyers have alleged that prison operations are in the hands not of Turkey's Ministry of Justice, but a counter-guerrilla team.

"Now there's talk of a peace process. In any peace process anywhere in the world, the parties sit down at the table," said Eren. "If we're talking about a real peace process, we need to have the two sides sit down at the same table."

(sö/dc/fk/cm)