Turkey arrests European activists probing prison conditions

ISTANBUL – Turkey has arrested six European activists who came to the country to examine prison conditions of political detainees, their lawyer told AFP on Feb 20.

They were detained in Istanbul on Feb 19 after meeting with a legal collective called the Office of People’s Rights (HHB), said Mr Naim Eminoglu, head of the Istanbul section of the Progressive Lawyers Association (CHD), who is defending them.

The six are from Italy, France, Spain, Belgium and Russia, he said.

Known for defending individuals seen as political opponents, HHB has been frequently targeted by Ankara on suspicion of ties to the Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C) – a far‑left group designated as a “terror group” by Turkey, Brussels and Washington – a charge denied by the collective.

“The international delegation of lawyers, journalists and rights activists arrived in Turkey on Feb 18,” Mr Eminoglu told AFP, saying they had been informed by police that they “had been arrested ahead of their expulsion” and their passports were confiscated.

“They were transferred to the migration directorate and were not allowed to meet with their lawyers. The CHD has learnt that they are now being taken to Istanbul airport to be deported,” he said.

According to the HHB, “the activists came to Turkey as part of an observation mission looking into the so‑called ‘well‑type’ prison system and the conditions of solitary confinement” under which certain political prisoners are being held.

The same information was confirmed to AFP by a French member of their collective.

In a post on X, the PCPE, a Spanish Communist party, said one of its members had been arrested together with the rest of the international delegation for looking into the well-type prisons in Turkey.

Turkey has been accused of placing some prisoners into tiny cells with no daylight where they are kept in isolation, creating the sensation of being inside a deep well – hence the name.

The practice has been denounced by rights organisations who have warned about the impact on the mental and physical health of the detainees.

The PCPE denounced the arrests, accusing Turkey of “arbitrarily detaining European citizens for defending human rights”.

It described the well-type prisons as “structures where prisoners are completely deprived of sunlight and social interaction and subjected to severe isolation”.

Their arrest came on the same day that police detained a Turkish journalist working for German public broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) on charges of “spreading false news” and “insulting the president”, the Istanbul prosecutor’s office said.

He was arrested in Ankara then driven to Istanbul where he was to appear in court on Feb 20, in a move that drew an angry reaction from DW which demanded his immediate release. AFP