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Turkey: Kurdish PKK rebel leader 'Ocalan'
poisoned in jail
2.3.2007
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March 2, 2007
ROME, March 1, -- Kurdish rebel leader
Abdullah Ocalan has been poisoned in jail in Turkey,
his lawyers said Thursday, demanding the United
Nations dispatch a medical team to investigate.
Ocalan's defence team showed reporters in the
Italian capital the results of tests indicating the
presence of what they said were toxic metals in the
Kurdish leader's hair.
Italian lawyer Giuliano Pisapia said Ocalan was
suffering a "progressive poisoning" and ruled out
the possibility that the metals had entered his body
naturally.
"There are only two other possibilities -- poisoning
through his food or through his water," he told a
press conference.
Lawyer Mahmut Sakar called on the United Nations and
the Council of Europe to send an "independent
medical delegation" to examine the PKK chief.
The defence team said they had sent unidentified
hair samples to French toxicologist Pascal Kintz,
who found levels of chromium seven times higher than
normal, as well as high levels of strontium.
His analysis was confirmed by laboratories in Oslo
and Rome, the lawyers said.
Lawyer Irfar Dundar said Ocalan was experiencing
breathing and skin problems as well as severe pain
which was interrupting his sleep. |
Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan
Jailed Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan Now, The only
prisoner on the Imrali Island in the Turkish Sea of
Marmara. photo from ROJ TV |
Ocalan is the head of
the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has been
fighting an armed separatist campaign against Ankara
since 1984. He has been in jail in Turkey since
1999.
The PKK is blacklisted as a terror group by Turkey,
the European Union and the United States, but to
many among the large Kurdish minority in Turkey its
members are fredom fighters.
The Turkish justice ministry said it had ordered an
investigation into the poisoning allegations, even
though it played down the claims as an attempt to
revive international interest in Ocalan.
The rebel leader has not been found to be in ill
health, it said in a statement. He is the only
inmate at a prison on the remote northwestern island
of Imrali.
"Abdullah Ocalan benefits from all rights that
people sentenced to life in prison are given in our
country," the statement said.
"He regularly undergoes medical check-ups. He has
suffered from no serious health problem so far."
The European Court of Human Rights, a body of the
Council of Europe, ruled in May 2005 that Ocalan's
trial was unfair and ordered a retrial. No retrial
was held and the Council of Europe last month
decided the matter was closed.
Ocalan was originally sentenced to death for his
separatist campaign but this was commuted to life in
2002.
Fighting between the PKK and Turkish security forces
has killed more than 37,000 people since 1984.
AFP
** The use of the term "Kurdistan" is vigorously
rejected due to its alleged political implications
by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize
the existence of a "Turkish Kurdistan" Southeast
Turkey.
Others estimate as many as 40 million Kurds live in
Big Kurdistan (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Armenia),
which covers an area as big as France, about half of
all Kurds which estimate to 20 million live in
Turkey.
Turkey is home to some 20 million ethnic Kurds, some
of whom openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey
The Kurdish flag flown officially in Iraqi Kurdistan but
unofficially flown by Kurds in Armenia. The flag is
banned in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where flying it is
a criminal offence"
Southeastern Turkey:
North Kurdistan (
Kurdistan-Turkey) wikipedia
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