INTERVIEWS WITH DETAINEES

Human Rights Watch/Helsinki interviewed twenty-five individuals who reported suffering torture, of which nineteen were men and six were women.31 Twenty-two were ethnic Kurds, and three were Turks. All were security detainees; none were held on non-political criminal charges. Thirteen reported suffering torture in 1995, ten in 1994, and two in 1993. Five of these interviews are presented below in full, while twenty are summarized in the Appendix to this report. Forty percent had been detained for 1-3 days, 16 percent between 4-7 days, 36 percent between 8-15 days, 8 percent between 15-30 days, and none more than 31 days. Ninety-two percent were detained by anti-terror police, 4 percent by regular police, and 4 percent by the gendarmerie.

Cem, age twenty-four, is a Turkish Alevi and lives in the Gazi section of Istanbul, scene of violent rioting in March 1995 that resulted in seventeen demonstrators being killed as a result of police fire.32 In September 1995, he was detained by police at a funeral for a leftist militant killed in a shoot-out with police. He testified that after the group he was detained with was released by order of a judge, the police detained him immediately again and brought him to the Aksaray Anti-Terror Branch police station. There he was held for eight days, during two of which he was systematically tortured. Cem reports that,

As soon as I got to the police station, I was blindfolded. For three or four hours, the police tried to get me to accept guilt for various crimes: bombings, being a MLKP militant, killing police.33 I refused their accusations. They then brought me to another room, stripped me naked, and hung me, four times with my arms straight out by my sides, and once with my arms behind me. Each time lasted about five-ten minutes. After they put you down, they spray you with high-pressure water and also pull and massage your arms to bring the circulation back. Your arms go dead, the pain is horrible. I still have problems with my right arm. They wrap your arms in foam, I guess not to leave marks. All the hanging and water lasted about six hours, interspersed with the same questions they asked me before the torture started.

Cem was brought back to his cell, and left there overnight and all of the next day, when, he recounted, he was brought back to the interrogation room at about seven p.m.

That night they came and took me. They hung me only once, but they gave me electric shock. They made me lie down face up on the floor, tied me, hit me with water, and attached a wire to my penis and gave me electric shock. This lasted about two hours, on and off. Sometimes one of them would put his foot on my throat to muffle my screams. They would also squeeze my testicles.

After that, Cem was questioned for the next six days and threatened, but suffered no physical torture. He stated that, "I had treatment for the last six days of my detention. The police would rub cream into my arms during the interrogation, joking that, 'You make propaganda against us. But even when we torture you we treat you well.'" On the eighth or ninth day, Cem was taken to a prosecutor, who sent him to the magistrate after reading his file. He was charged, under Article 168 of the Turkish Criminal Code, with membership in an illegal organization.

Orhan, age twenty-eight, is an ethnic Kurd and engineer who was arrested in Erzincan in October 1994 while attending a funeral for a militant who was killed in a clash with security forces. While on the way out of the city, he and several others were detained at a checkpoint and taken away by anti-terror police to their headquarters in Erzincan. During his period of detention he reports being severely tortured. According to Orhan,

I was tortured for five straight days and nights with breaks in between, and for the whole period I was naked. The police accused me of being a member of T¤KKO.34 I was hung seven times, including from behind. While they were doing this they would give me electric shocks to my penis and toes. My head would snap back. They pulled my hair, hit me with something like a sand bag in the kidneys, and squeezed my penis. I was also hit with high-pressure water, especially when they were giving me electricity. They threatened to rape me with a night stick, but didn't, though one stuck his finger in my anus.

Orhan also suffered threats to his family and of summary execution. He reports that,

They asked me to sign a statement, but I was blindfolded. I refused. One officer told me that "We will bring your mother here and fuck her and do the same to your sister if you don't sign." On the third day I was taken to a field, again blindfolded. They began to play with their guns, loading them, cocking them. One said, "Clashes happen here everyday. We can kill you and say it happened in a clash."

Orhan was charged, under Article 168, with membership in an illegal organization and taken for a week to Erzincan prison and then to Erzurum E-Type Prison. He was acquitted of this charge in March 1995 and released from prison. During this entire period he was permitted to consult with his legal counsel only three times.

Haso, age thirty-one, is an ethnic Kurd who migrated from MuÕ province in southeastern Turkey to Adana where he owns a shop. He has lived in Adana for almost twenty years. He was imprisoned from 1981-1984 for connection with Dev-Yol, an illegal militant leftist group; after his release, he was detained briefly three times, but not tortured. In July 1995, he was detained by anti-terror police in Adana and tortured severely. According to Haso,

The police came to my shop and took me away to give a statement. Once we got to the station, however, I was blindfolded and accused of being a member of T¤KB (Tárkiye ¤htilalci Kománistler Birli-i).35 They took me to a room and said, "Just talk, don't make us waste time." They asked me to strip naked, and then hit me with high pressure water. They wrapped my arms in something soft, like a towel, asked me to step on a chair, attached my arms to something, and then kicked out the chair. I was hanging there five-ten minutes. During this time they hit me with more cold water and put electric shocks to my penis and big toe. They would take me down when I began to pass out, wait some time, then hang me again or give me electricity. They also squeezed my testicles; one wanted to put something up my anus, but another stopped him.

Such torture reportedly went on over a period of three days. The interrogators would alternate this maltreatment with a medical check of Haso, including rubbing cream on his affected limbs. They even played "bad cop-good cop": one officer would offer him tea and cigarettes, commenting that the police "did not take pleasure in this," while another would growl, "If you don't accept this statement, we will bring your wife and torture her in front of you."

After the third day, Haso reported that he was not tortured again, though interrogation periods continued. His wife brought him a package on his fourth day of detention. On the fifteenth day of his detention, he was brought before a prosecutor and a judge. He told the prosecutor of his torture, though he did not react, according to Haso. The judge ordered him to be arrested and remanded into custody, under Article 168 of the Turkish Penal Code, charged with membership in an illegal organization. He first consulted with his lawyer on the twentieth day of his detention. In September 1995, he was released from custody, though his trial continues. He refused to accept the statement police prepared for him, which was taken under torture.

Ôule, a thirty-one-year-old Kurdish woman, works as a nurse in Izmir where she has lived for twenty years. Over a period of several days in October 1994, anti-terror police detained her, her husband, and several other individuals alleging that they were members of an illegal organization Rizgari. She reports that both she and her husband were tortured and arrested. She was released in December. According to Ôule,

Shortly after my arrest, I was brought into a room. My husband was also brought in. He had been tortured: he was shaking and there was fear in his eyes. One of the policemen in the room said, "Have a chat with your husband. Learn what happened to him. We don't want this to happen to you." After that, he was taken out, I was asked to undress, then they blindfolded me, strapped me down, and put a ring on my left little toe. They gave me electricity through this and then with another wire that they touched to my breasts, genitals, and other parts of my body. They were hitting me with water as they did this. This lasted about five minutes or so. They were asking me questions during this time. They unstrapped me, put me on a cement floor, and told me to put myclothes back on. I wasn't able to do that or to walk, so they brought me wet back to a cell and left me alone.

After this, Ôule was slapped and punched during her interrogation period, which lasted ten days, but was not subjected to other forms of abuse or torture. On her third day of detention she was able to see her lawyer. On her tenth day of detention, she was taken to a prosecutor and a judge. She was arrested and remanded into custody under Article 169, aiding illegal groups. She told the prosecutor that she had been tortured, but he reportedly had no reaction.

Kemal, a former policeman who spent over five years on the force starting in the late 1980s and was arrested in the early 1990s on allegations that he was aiding an outlawed violent leftist group. He reported being tortured over a period of nine days. He is a Kurd. According to Kemal,

I was arrested in the fall of 1993...The arresting officers kicked me and punched me terribly. I thought they would kill me. I was blindfolded and taken away, eventually ending up in an interrogation room. They beat me again with their fists, then stopped and told me to 'think things over.' They took me to another room, the "electricity room." They stripped me, strapped me down to a table with belts, poured water over me, pulled trousers across my neck and then attached a wire to my right small toe and started to give me electricity. I shook when they gave me the electricity, then they would hit me with another wire all over my body. This happened for what seemed like twenty minutes at a time, over a period of nine days. After the electricity there would be hanging. I was also put in front of a fan, wet. During the whole time I was blindfolded. On the ninth day I was shown at a press conference, when I also was given access to a lawyer.

Later he was brought to a cell, where he spent the next six days, after which was brought before a prosecutor and charged, under Article 169 of the Turkish Penal Code, with giving aid and comfort to an illegal organization. He told Human Rights Watch/Helsinki that,

I was peeing blood. My kidneys hurt. Two days before I was brought to the prosecutor, a doctor examined me. He really didn't do much at all and didn't listen to my complaints. The prosecutor was the same. I told him that I had been tortured and that I had signed my statement under torture-hadn't even read it. He didn't react. The police had told me that if I rejected the statement in front of the prosecutor, I would be tortured again.

Kemal spent fourteen months in prison and then was released. His trial under Article 169 continues. He was fired from the police force under Law #2559, the "Police Responsibility and Authority Law."