Ankara-Sana
Lawyer Aytag Onal and Attorney Abru Temtek announced an open-ended hunger strike last night to protest against human rights violations targeting human rights defenders and various groups of the Turkish people who are subjected to the most heinous policies of arbitrariness, political, social and psychological persecution by Recep Tayyip Erdogan's regime.
A statement issued by the Association of Progressive Jurists and the Turkish People's Lawyers' Office explained that Tymtik and Onal decided to enter into this open strike to demand the release of the president of the association, Selcuk Kuzcıgli, and the seven members of its administrative body who were arrested after the court sentenced them and 12 other lawyers from the association members to prison for different periods Its total reached 159 years.
On the International Law Day, the statement appealed to all human rights organizations in the world to take a solidarity stance against the detained Turkish lawyers "who pay the price for opposing Erdogan's authoritarian and anti-democratic policies."
The security services of the Erdogan regime raided the headquarters of the Progressive Jurists Association more than once and arrested its president and a number of its officials after they visited Syria in January 2013 to express their solidarity with them and stressed the necessity of trying Erdogan because of his direct and exposed support for the terrorist organizations that target it.
Lawyers Onal and Temtik strike comes two days after the death of Turkish singer Helen Polak after a hunger strike that lasted about 300 days.
It is noteworthy that despite these strikes and calls to protest against the repressive practices by Erdogan's regime, this did not receive any response from him to continue the suffering of detainees and opponents in his prisons to this day.