JINHA

ISTANBUL – Turkey’s Academics for Peace have held a press conference to share their call for the Turkish state to end its attacks on Kurdish regions. The academics have announced that they will continue Parliamentary and international activities as long as their demands are not met.

As Turkey’s ruling AKP implements a state of blockade and curfew against the provinces of Kurdistan, academics gathered in Istanbul to announce their opposition to the severe violations of rights in the region. Alper Açık spoke on behalf of Academics for Peace at Istanbul’s Taksim Gönen Hotel.

“The Turkish state has effectively condemned its citizens in Sur, Silvan, Nusaybin, Cizre, Silopi, and many other towns and neighborhoods in the Kurdish provinces to hunger through its use of curfews that have been ongoing for weeks,” said the statement. “It has attacked these settlements with heavy weapons and equipment that would only be mobilized in wartime. As a result, the right to life, liberty, and security, and in particular the prohibition of torture and ill-treatment protected by the constitution and international conventions have been violated.”

The academics demanded that the state immediately stop the massacre and forced displacement of the peoples of the Kurdistan region; punish perpetrators of human rights violations; compensate aggrieved citizens; and allow independent national and international observers into the region. The academics called for the government to allow for peace negotiations involving representatives of a range of segments of society, in which academics are prepared to participate.

Alper announced that as long as Turkey did not recognize these demands, the academics would continue contacting individuals in Turkey’s Parliament and internationally in order to raise awareness of the scope of the violations.

1,128 academics from dozens of universities in Turkey, in addition to academics from many more countries, signed the statement, according to academic Zeynep Kıvılcım. She noted that the state has escalated repression in Turkey’s universities in parallel with the escalating violence in the Kurdish provinces.

“We will continue to struggle, organize and strengthen our existing organizations against all of this. We will defend the right to opposition and resistance, peace and negotiation, with panels and activities at the universities. We will continue to be in solidarity with our colleagues and students who have been imprisoned for their thoughts,” said Zeynep.

(ck/fk/cm)