Human Rights Developments

Defending Human Rights

The Role of the International Community

In a policy paper prepared as part of the E.U. accession process, the Turkish government's Special Committee on Turkey-E.U. Relations made the welcome suggestion that "the constructive function of nongovernmental organizations in raising human rights awareness should be encouraged and there should be closer cooperation and communication with them." This intention was not well reflected in practice, as members of Turkish human rights organizations were obstructed in their work in various ways ranging from ill-treatment to prosecution. Public demonstrations and press conferences on human rights issues were repeatedly prohibited by local officials or broken up by police, sometimes violently.

The Diyarbakir and Van branches of the Human Rights Association (HRA) and the Malatya branch of the Association of Human Rights and Solidarity for Oppressed Peoples (Mazlum-Der) were closed for much of the year by order of local governors or the governor of the Emergency Region.

The governor of the Emergency Region prevented a delegation of the Diyarbakir Democracy Platform, a group of civil society organizations, from crossing the border with northern Iraq where they hoped to investigate the killing of an estimated forty civilians during the Turkish armed forces' bombing of Lolan, Kendakor region, in northern Iraq in August.