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Turkish rebel leader Ocalan 'in serious
condition' after heart attack
9.2.2006
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ROME, Feb 8, 2006
(AFP) - 19h48 - Jailed Kurdish leader Abdullah
Ocalan is in serious condition after suffering a
heart attack, his lawyers told the Italian news
agency ANSA Wednesday.
Ocalan, 57, who launched a bloody Kurdish rebellion
in southeast Turkey in 1984, was condemned to death
in 1999 for treason, but his sentence was commuted
to life imprisonment in 2002 after Turkey abolished
capital punishment as part of efforts to align with
European Union democracy norms.
He had a heart attack Tuesday in his prison on the
Turkish island of Imrali, his Italian lawyers
Giuliano Piasapia, Luigi Saraceni and Arturo Salerno
said. |
Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan-
Kurdistan-Turkey. |
They appealed to the European Union and the European
Committee for the Prevention of Torture to allow
both them and his family to see Ocalan to check
about his health.
Ocalan last month formally asked to be retried in
Turkey after the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR)
ruled last year that his trial was unfair.
Ocalan's demand poses a legal challenge to the
government because current laws do not allow for his
retrial, but Ankara is under pressure to comply with
the rulings of the court, another of his lawyers,
Ibrahim Bilmez, has said.
Recommending a retrial, the court ruled in May that
the Turkish court that convicted Ocalan was not
impartial because it included a military judge
during part of the trial and because Ocalan and his
lawyers were denied the required time and facilities
to prepare their defense.
Ankara has said it will respect the ruling, but the
authorities have so far failed to clarify how they
will proceed.
Turkey and a number of Western countries including
the European Union and the United States consider
Ocalan's separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) a
terrorist organization.
AFP
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