Lesvos. Greece. March 19. Since its election on an anti-immigrant platform, the ruling New Democracy party in Greece has publicly pushed for the establishment of closed detention centres for migrants who enter the country from Turkey, with the intention of their eventual deportation to Turkey or their country of origin.
After facing months of obstacles, including the opposition of human rights groups, local communities and governments across the Aegean islands to the construction of these closed structures, recent measures taken ostensibly to control the spread of COVID-19 are paving the way to the mass detention of migrants in Lesvos.
from ROJAVA AZADI SHARED WITH THANKS #WomenDefendRojava
Las compañeras de la campaña Women Defend Rojava, que son parte del movimiento de mujeres en el Norte y Este de Siria (Kongra Star), han lanzado un nuevo dossier que analiza la violencia contra las mujeres y propone soluciones desde la filosofía y práctica del movimiento para hacer frente a ella.
Recientemente hemos visto un aumento de la violencia contra las mujeres y un aumento de los casos de feminicidios. Al mismo tiempo, también podemos observar la creciente resistencia a esta violencia patriarcal.
Con nuestro nuevo librito “Autodefensa: La respuesta a la violencia machista”, analizamos brevemente la historia, así como a los desarrollos actuales, de esa violencia y la resistencia de las mujeres.
Nosotras, como Kongra Star, el movimiento de mujeres de Rojava, seguimos esta creciente violencia sistemática, pero también la organización de la resistencia contra ella.
Tanto la lucha de las mujeres en Chile contra las políticas neoliberales del gobiernocomo la de las mujeres bosnias exigiendo justicia contra el feminicidio durante la guerra de Bosnia. Las mujeres afganas las que luchan contra el fundamentalismo y por sus derechos y las mujeres kurdas que luchan contra la ocupación.
Contra esta creciente mentalidad patriarcal y la violencia que genera, la autodefensa es necesaria.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s Islamist government has rejected calls from human rights organizations to release inmates from two overcrowded prisons despite detection in those facilities of the coronavirus, which has caused the death of more than 8,000 people around the world.
A purge of thousands of dissidents in the aftermath of a coup attempt in July 2016 has filled Turkey’s prisons, which today are overcrowded with tens of thousands of political prisoners.
Following the quarantine of a prison in Edirne, a Turkish province that borders Greece, on March 16, 2020, Kepsut Prison, located in northwestern Balıkesir province, was also quarantined the next day.
China, Italy, Iran and Bahrain have released prisoners over coronavirus concerns. The Iranian government has temporarily released 85,000 inmates in an emergency move to stop the spread of COVID-19.
The Turkish government has also rejected opposition parties’ calls for parliamentary meetings to discuss the coronavirus pandemic and killed this week’s motion to establish an investigation committee to look into the disease.
On Wednesday Erdoğan announced a number of measures to battle the spread of the coronavirus following an emergency meeting convened to coordinate the fight. Yet the release of prisoners was not among the measures disclosed by the Turkish president.
Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu, a member of parliament from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) and one of Turkey’s most prominent human rights defenders, revealed how he received news from Edirne Prison that three prison guards tested positive there for COVID-19, as a result of which the prison was put under quarantine.
\ A day later, Balıkesir’s Kepsut Prision was also quarantined, Turkish media reported. “A short while ago my husband called and informed me that contamination in a cell had been detected and that they had put everyone in quarantine,” the wife of an inmate told reporters.
On March 16 Gergerlioğlu launched a campaign for the release of all prisoners starting with those at greatest risk and submitted a parliamentary question directed to the Ministry of Justice about health conditions in the country’s prisons.
Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu
A number of health institutions and human rights organizations held a joint press conference on March 16, 2020 at which the Civil Society Association for the Department of Corrections (Ceza İnfaz Sisteminde Sivil Toplum Derneği, or CİSST), the Human Rights Association’s Istanbul branch, the Istanbul Chamber of Dentists, the Istanbul Chamber of Doctors, the Public Law Research Foundation, the Human Rights Foundation of Turkey, the Lawyers Association for Freedom and others released a joint press statement calling on the justice ministry to take necessary measures against the coronavirus in prisons and to implement those measures in a manner compatible with human dignity and does not lead to a violation of rights.
The organizations urged the justice ministry to postpone the sentences of prisoners who are in high risk groups or who are unable to take care of their personal hygiene. The disabled, the elderly, children, pregnant women and inmates suffering from chronic diseases should be considered, the groups said.
“In order to protect the health of inmates in prisons and to ensure a clean environment conducive to personal hygiene, cleaning supplies should immediately be provided free of charge to prisoners,” the statement said.
According to the press release, inmates should be provided with adequate, balanced and healthy nutrition; the files of sick prisoners who have applied for postponement of the execution of their sentences for health reasons pursuant to Article 16 of the Law on the Execution of Sentences should quickly be reviewed, and those prisoners should be provided opportunities for treatment outside the prison; prisons should have an adequate number of health personnel on staff; and all inmates, prison personnel and relatives of prisoners who show symptoms of the coronavirus should immediately be tested.
Turkey’s health institutions and human rights organizations held a joint press conference on March 16, 2020
In an interview with the Medyascope news website, Gergerlioğlu underlined the fact that there are around 300,000 people in Turkey’s prisons, a number far above the country’s prison capacity, and that the problem of overcrowding in prison had previously led to a scabies outbreak.
“Sick and elderly inmates as well as pregnant women and mothers should be evacuated as a priority. We have seen overcrowded prison wards during our visits. There was mold and humidity. People could not even breathe,” he stated. He also pointed to imprisoned cancer patients, whose immune systems have presumably been weakened by their condition.
“It does not seem possible for prison administrations to manage such a crisis under these circumstances,” he also tweeted on March 16, adding: “You are taking drastic measures for the general population, but not for the prisons. This is a grievous wrongdoing! You cannot leave these people alone behind bars with a deadly disease.”
Despite the aforementioned developments, Justice Minister Abdülhamit Gül claimed that no inmate has thus far tested positive for the coronavirus and that meetings with lawyers have been restricted as part of measures to contain the epidemic.
Yet, according to lawyers and human rights defenders, this measure is not enough to prevent the spread of the coronavirus to prisons and detention centers.
There are currently 11,000 women and around 800 children in Turkish prisons and holding facilities.
Criminal law expert Professor Adem Sözüer indicated that judicial supervision mechanisms such as the requirement to regularly report to a local police station and a ban on travel abroad should be used more effectively as a preventive measure, saying: “Being essentially a political process requiring the enactment of new laws, legislation to reduce sentences and to regulate their execution would take time. Yet, the use of judicial supervision is left to the discretion of judges and prosecutors who can quickly put it into effect,” urging judges to opt for conditional release instead of incarceration.
According to Nesrin Nas, former leader of the Motherland Party (Anavatan), the restriction of meetings with lawyers cannot be a solution. “Prisons are at great risk. Restricting meetings with lawyers is not a solution.
There is no water in many prisons. Wards are full to the brim. Inmates are not exposed to sunshine and they are malnourished. At the very least, political prisoners and children should be released. Should the outbreak spread to prisons, it will be transformed into a mass slaughter.” nordicmonitor.com
154th journalist imprisoned in Turkey by ErdoganAsli Ceren Aslan, editor of the newspaper Özgür Gelecek (Free Future) was arrested on 9 February in the province of Urfa province, Kurdish southeast of Turkey. She was “officially” arrested in Urfa, near the border with Syria while following the events in Syria and Rojava Kurdistan.
Damning UN report slams Turkey, revealing the extent of its anti-Kurdish war
Feminists Seve, Fatma and Pakiza killed.
Feminists Seve, Fatma and Pakiza killed. Ambulance blocked by police. DBP Silopi District Co-Chair, Gülşen Özden speaking to BBC Turkish in Silopi on killings of politician women said she received a phone call around 7:35 p.m. and the voice on the other end said they were shot and called for an ambulance. “They phoned me again in a few minutes saying ‘We are losing blood, hurry up. We all will die if you don’t come in 10 minutes’. By the time the bodies were rescued they held 19 bullets. Daily massacres took place in Eastern Turkey (North Kurdistan) as the Turkish police and half million strong army indulged in pogroms against the Kurdish population, who demand autonomous self-rule (but not a new state).
Europe is the epicenter of coronavirus, and Spain now has the second most cases in Europe, with more than 3,431 new cases in 24 hours and the number of deaths doubling.
We’ll go to Madrid for an update, where more than half of the country’s cases have been reported. This comes as the Spanish government announced it is nationalizing hospitals and private healthcare companies to better manage the pandemic. We are joined by María Carrión, a freelance journalist and former Democracy Now!
In Spain, the nationwide lockdown to combat the spread of COVID-19 "goes beyond" the typical state of emergency for natural disasters, says @mariacarrionq. The government has taken control of "health facilities and both public and private initiatives." https://t.co/q6u8xNhrw9pic.twitter.com/FHiciEU6gB
AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show in Spain, which is now the second European country to impose a nationwide lockdown, after 2,000 new coronavirus cases were confirmed in the last 24 hours and the number of deaths doubled. Spain now has the second most cases in Europe after Italy, the fourth highest number worldwide, with nearly 20,000 infections and nearly 750 deaths. Spain’s Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska announced the country was shutting down to slow the spread of coronavirus.
AMY GOODMAN: As the European Union voted on a proposal to shut all external borders and impose a 30-day continent-wide foreign travel ban, Portugal has already suspended all passenger air and rail traffic with neighboring Spain until April 15th. At the border checkpoints, Spain is now allowing only Spaniards, residents of Spain, cross-border workers and diplomats to enter the country.
AMY GOODMAN: This comes as the Spanish government announced it’s nationalizing hospitals and private healthcare companies to better manage the pandemic. Over the weekend, the Spanish people came outside to cheer medical workers in the streets as the country prepared to shut down. And the Spanish government has just announced a moratorium on mortgage payments and guarantee that basic services — that’s water, gas, electricity — will not be shut off for nonpayment during the crisis.
For more, we go to Madrid, Spain, where we’re joined by Maria Carrion, freelance journalist, former Democracy Now! producer.
UPDATE.. DEFENDER War Games now PARTLY CALLED OFF !!
17 March..US halts deployment & recalls troops from NATO’s biggest drill ‘Defender Europe 2020’ due to coronavirus threat
Rick Rozoff, peace activist at StopNato International, thinks it’s incredibly ironic that a virus seems to have derailed, however temporarily, NATO’s strategic priority to expand to the Russian border.“This is a tactical retreat, in the face of nature,” he told RT. “I’m going to have to assume that, if and when the coronavirus is brought under control, that we’ll see the resumption of such military provocations, large-scale military exercises on Russia’s western border.”
In the midst of a staggering virus epidemic that has shut much of Europe down, the insane and arrogant United States began sending 30,000 Army troops throughout Europe for war games.
As the soldiers emerged from their transport planes they shook the hands of US and European military officials welcoming them to the hot bed of corona-virus.
Exercise DEFENDER-Europe 20, now cut back but not cancelled, is the deployment of a division-size combat-credible force from the United States to Europe, the drawing of equipment and the movement of personnel and equipment across the theater to various training areas.
U.S.-based equipment was due to leave from ports in four states and arrive in six European countries. This would require the support of tens of thousands of service members and civilians in multiple nations. U.S. service members were planned to spread out across the region to establish intermediate staging bases with multinational forces and participate in various annual exercises.
DEFENDER-Europe 20, now cut back due to the withdrawal of the German contingent, was to be the largest deployment of U.S.-based forces to Europe for an exercise in the more than 25 years.
By Gia Oney | Landstuhl Regional Medical Center | March 15 ………………………..With confirmed positive cases of the 2019 novel coronavirus, or COVID-19, in the Kaiserslautern and Wiesbaden Military Communities, many concerned community members may be wondering whether or not they have been exposed to the virus if they had any contact with the infected patients or their families.
In order to dispel rumors and misinformation, Landstuhl Regional Medical Center Public Health Officials want to share the process by which potentially impacted people are identified and notified.
According to U.S. Army Col. Rodney Coldren, chief of preventive medicine for Public Health Command Europe, the community is not at risk from someone who is a “close contact” of someone infected with COVID-19, as long as they are not displaying symptoms themselves.
“The people who came into contact with family members (of infected COVID-19 patients) are at absolutely no additional risk beyond that of being out in the general community,”
Ostensibly this massive war game is to ‘protect’ the people of Europe from the exaggerated ‘threat’ from an attack by Russia. Of course that is total nonsense. The US-NATO are in fact threatening Russia and when these wars games are over much of the military hardware delivered there will be left in large new ‘storage depot’ bases located in Poland and other locations near Russian borders..
Of course the US will likely be ‘leaving’ and ‘spreading’ something much more dangerous during these exercises. There is no way in hell that during this current pandemic many of these troops wouldn’t become ‘carriers’ of the virus. What message is being sent to the people of Italy, Germany or France that they should lock themselves inside their homes while US troops play war throughout Europe?
Peace groups in Europe are now demanding that these provocative war games be cancelled and finally the US military is being forced to cut back the War Games.
But what happens when likely already ‘contaminated’ troops return to the US – to be fanned out across the nation – bringing home the contagion that they carry inside their bursting patriotic chests which now are loaded with the virus?
When will the world begin to realize that the USA is not here to help you? Update: On March 13, 2020, the German Bundeswehr command announced a decision to withdraw from the NATO anti-Russian exercises Defender Europe 20 . Due to the spread of corona-virus, German troops will not be involved in maneuvers. The main training venue is training grounds in Poland and Germany.
The departure of the Bundeswehr from the exercises of Defender Europe 20 means a stop on the entire supply line of military equipment and weapons for the exercises. According to the AFP news agency, the further transfer of American soldiers to exercises from the US through German airports has been stopped. This means the actual curtailment though not complete cancellation of the War Games.
U.S. European Command (EUCOM) announced that the number of U.S. troops participating in DEFENDER-Europe 20 was being cut back, although several U.S. units have already arrived and moved into position in NATO alliance states.
“In light of the current corona-virus outbreak, we will modify the exercise by reducing the number of U.S. participants,” the EUCOM statement said. “Activities associated with the exercise will be adjusted accordingly, and we’ll work closely with allies and partners to meet our highest priority training objectives.”
As part of a modified war exercise, they expect that an armored brigade combat team already deployed to Europe will conduct gunnery and other combined training together with Allies.
In parallel, preparations for war games called Aurora 20 is continuing according to plan. Aurora 20 – the largest military exercise in years will include a debut of the Pentagon’s Patriot missile system – is due to take place in Sweden from May 11 to June 7. Preparations already include transport of equipment and soldiers to Sweden.
Mustafa Koçak, a jailed member of the Grup Yorum band who has been on a hunger strike for 254 days in an İzmir prison, was removed from his cell and brought to a hospital where he was subjected to involuntary treatment as well as torture, the Bianet news website reported..
The revelation was made by Koçak’s lawyer, Ezgi Çakır, who released a video statement in which she described the details of the intervention her client endured.
Mustafa, in happier times.
“He was dragged out of his jail cell while tied to a chair and taken to the Şakran Prison’s hospital campus on Thursday at around 4:30 p.m.,” Çakır said, adding that they were prevented from seeing him for four days, despite appealing to the prosecutor’s office and the hospital administration.
She said she was only able to see Koçak after he was brought back to another prison.
“He told me what he went through for five days, and I intend to reveal this to the public,” she said.
“He told me he was subjected to forcible treatment for five days by three doctors including the hospital’s chief physician and an internist, that he explicitly stated that he did not agree to the treatment and that they put him on a drip anyway.”
“He showed me his arms, which were black and blue all over, from his shoulders to his wrists.”
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Asli Ceren Aslan, editor of the newspaper Özgür Gelecek (Free Future) was arrested on 9 February in the province of Urfa province, Kurdish southeast of Turkey. She was “officially” arrested in Urfa, near the border with Syria while following the events in Syria and Rojava Kurdistan.
The Free 
