Turkey prepares show trial for Ocalan
By Norm Dixon
Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan has already been judged and sentenced to death by the Turkish regime — all that remains is the formality of the stage-managed "trial" that begins on May 31.
Ocalan is the popular leader of the left-wing PKK, the party at the head of the Kurdish people's struggle for national self-determination in Turkey. He is charged with "terrorism" and "treason".
Kurds make up 20% of Turkey's population of about 60 million, with 12-15 million living in the south-east near the border with Iraq. Kurdistan straddles northern Iraq, north-western Iran, northern Syria, south-eastern Turkey and parts of Armenia. The biggest portion lies within the borders of Turkey.
The PKK, formed in 1978, launched an armed struggle in 1984 after it concluded that avenues of peaceful and legal struggle had been closed by the Turkish regime. Successive Turkish regimes — military and "civilian" — have attempted to crush the Kurdish struggle with scorched earth tactics, ethnic-cleansing and forced assimilation.
Ankara has obliterated around 3000 villages and expelled 2 million villagers from the south-east. Military death squads routinely arrest and torture, murder or "disappear" those suspected of being PKK sympathisers.
Until 1991, all use of the Kurdish language was banned. It remains illegal for Kurdish to be used in publishing, broadcasting and educational and political institutions.
Since 1995, the Turkish military has launched annual invasions of southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq) to destroy the PKK and sow terror among the large number of Kurdish refugees from Turkey living there. The large body-counts of dead "terrorists" announced by the military are more often than not hapless refugees rather than PKK fighters.
The death toll since 1984 is estimated at between 29,000 and 37,000, the vast majority at the hands of the Turkish military. Ankara has perversely indicted Ocalan personally for every death in the Kurdish liberation struggle.
Judicial assassination
From the moment he was abducted by Turkish special forces in Kenya on February 15 — with the cooperation of US and Israeli intelligence services — Ocalan has been cruelly treated by his captors and his rights trampled upon. Images of Ocalan bound and gagged before the Turkish flag were aimed at demoralising and humiliating the Kurdish people.
The chauvinist Turkish press has played along with this state-sponsored character assassination by printing "leaked" transcripts supposedly of Ocalan pleading for his life, admitting to the prosecution's charges and promising to abandon the struggle. These "confessions" bear the unmistakable stamp of the Turkish secret police. The government, the military and the press are preparing the ground for Ocalan's judicial assassination.
All pretence of a "fair" trial has been dispensed with. Ocalan's defence lawyers have been unable to meet with their client in private to prepare his case. Ocalan is denied pens and paper and access to defence and prosecution documents.
His lawyers have been beaten by right-wing mobs and by police. The government has refused to provide the lawyers with state protection.
In a clear signal of what awaits the PKK leader, a juryless state security court on May 20 sentenced a one-time high ranking PKK fighter to death. The former leader, Semdin Sakik, was shown no mercy even though he had defected from the PKK and offered to join Ankara's war against the PKK. Sakik and his brother Arif, who was also given the death sentence, were forced to defend themselves after their lawyers received death threats.
Even though the May 31 court proceedings will be little more than a pantomime, Ankara is taking no chances that Ocalan will use the international attention to win support for the cause of the Kurdish people.
Harassment
Harassment of the defence has continued. On May 25, prosecutors charged defence lawyer Niyazi Bulgan with "aiding an illegal organisation" after his secretary, Belgian-born Sibel Ceylan, was arrested at Istanbul airport. Ceylan was found with a copy of the official indictment against Ocalan, which she was taking to Kurdish supporters in Europe.
The real reason that Ceylan was detained was because she was carrying a formal complaint over Ocalan's treatment to the European Court of Human Rights. If convicted, Bulgan and Ceylan face long prison sentences.
It has also been revealed that Ocalan will be confined to a bullet-proof glass box during the trial on the remote prison island of Imrali. Ocalan will be able to communicate only with the chief judge. He will be unable to hear the proceedings or the defence. It is a blatant ruse to silence the Kurdish leader.
International observers will be given no special recognition or reserved places for the trial. The limited number of journalists will be required to leave all pens and pencils, notebooks, cameras and mobile telephones behind on the mainland and will be forbidden to communicate with the outside world while on the island.
The restrictions have prompted Ocalan's leading defence lawyer, Ahmet Zeki Okcuolglu, to boycott the proceedings. "I refuse to take part in this farce", he told the Associated Press on May 25.
On May 25, the Turkish daily Hurriyet reported that recently re-elected PM Bulent Ecevit had agreed to change the juryless, three-judge state security courts by removing judges appointed by the military. The courts have drawn strong criticism from human rights organisations and the European Union.
While the change would be token, it reflects the international pressure the Turkish regime is under to conduct a trial that Western governments can proclaim "free and fair". The fact remains that the civilian judges are appointed by the justice ministry and rarely make decisions at odds with the government's view.
There is a chance Ocalan's trial may be postponed to allow the new government coalition — which is likely to bring together Ecevit's right-wing Democratic Left Party, the far-right Nationalist Action Party and the conservative Motherland Party — to pass the necessary constitutional amendment needed to make the court changes.
Ocalan's defence team's web page is at http://www.asrinhukuk.com/english/.