Asrın Law Office made a new application to the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) in relation to their client, Kurdish People’s Leader Abdullah Öcalan, who has long been kept in absolute isolation in Imralı F-Type High Security Prison and has not been heard from for 41 months.

According to the Mezopotamya Agency (MA), the application includes developments regarding Abdullah Öcalan and other prisoners in İmralı, Ömer Hayri Konar, Hamili Yıldırım and Veysi Aktaş, covering the period of May-June-July 2024.

The file sent to the CPT stated that a total of 36 applications were made between 1 May and 30 July, including 24 for lawyer visits and 12 for family visits, but all of them were left unanswered.

It was emphasised that applications for family and lawyer visits have been prevented on the grounds of at least 23 ‘disciplinary penalties’ since 14 September 2018.

On 4 July, a new 3-month ‘disciplinary punishment’ was imposed before the expiry of the last ‘disciplinary punishment’ dated 12 April 2024.

In the report submitted to the CPT, it was pointed out that the process in question was carried out in secret from the lawyers and finalised in violation of the law.

In the application, it was said that 3 different earthquakes occurred in the Marmara Sea within the 3 months in question, and public concerns about İmralı increased due to the bans on lawyer and family visits and the unanswered applications.

The alternating hunger strikes and boycotts carried out in prisons since November 2023 against the İmralı isolation were also included in the file.

Asrın Law Office also drew attention to the campaigns against isolation at the international level, especially the appeal by 69 Nobel Laureates for the release of Abdullah Öcalan.

The application, which also highlighted the CPT’s duties of detection and prevention, drew attention to the statement made by the CPT on 3 July concerning Azerbaijan, which did not end the violations and did not comply with the recommendations in the reports prepared by the CPT after the visits.

The application stated: “While there has not been a single improvement in the conditions of İmralı Prison since the past, while there has been a terrible level of incommunicado, especially since 2011, while the findings and recommendations in 5 of your reports from your 9 visits in total have not been fulfilled, especially since 2010, while the report of the 2019 visit was allowed to be published after the conditions became outdated, and it was even decided to systematically ban family, lawyer and telephone rights in the September 2020 period immediately after the release of this report, while the 2022 visit report has not been allowed to be released since its submission, while there has been no news from Mr. Öcalan and other applicants for more than 40 months, while all ties with the outside world have been severed, your Committee’s failure to follow the procedure set out in Article 10/2 of your convention in particular, and its tendency not to disclose the 2022 report as in the case of Azerbaijan, may lead to the further continuation of the systematic torture regime in İmralı.”

The lawyers remarked that the CPT should abandon its usual procedures in the face of the extraordinary conditions in İmralı and called for the CPT to carry out the relevant procedures to eliminate the conditions of ill-treatment and the ‘incommunicado’ state, listing their demands as follows:

“*Arrange an urgent ad hoc visit to İmralı Prison in the face of the fact that the current conditions in İmralı have continued in uncertainty and gradually hardened since your last visit on 22 September 2022, and that the conditions have reached a new level in a period of 2 years,

* Take all necessary initiatives to ensure that the current conditions of detention of the applicants are brought in line with human dignity, that all communication rights that will ensure and protect their ties with the outside world, especially visits by their lawyers and families, are fulfilled, and that systematic unlawful bans are put an end to,

* We demand that a coercive measure be taken to eliminate the conditions of torture, inhumanity and ill-treatment and the 41-month incommunicado state, that the procedure regulated in Article 10/2 of the Convention be initiated and declared, that the general observations made regarding the İmralı extraordinary isolation regime since the past, especially the findings made during the visit on 22 September 2022 be shared with the public, especially in the case that lawyer and family visits cannot be ensured as soon as possible, and that the visit report dated 22 September 2022 be added to the statement within the scope of the procedure.”