Franco-Turkish researcher and activist Pinar Selek, who has been living in exile since 2009, has come under renewed attack from Turkey. Solidarity committees are mobilising to support her and are calling on the French government to back her.
The Turkish state is continuing its persecution of Pinar Selek, a sociologist and writer, environmentalist, feminist and anti-militarist activist from Turkey.
On 21 June 2022, the Turkish state news agency announced that the Turkish Supreme Court had overturned Pinar Selek’s fourth acquittal, handed down on 19 December 2014 by the Istanbul Criminal Court.
Previously, Pinar Selek had actually appeared in three criminal proceedings, all of which found her innocent, throughout the 25 years of politico-judicial persecution she continues to endure. After imprisoning and torturing her for her sociological research on the Kurds, the Turkish authorities decided to make her a « terrorist » by fabricating the evidence needed to prove, against all the evidence, that an attack on the Istanbul spice market took place in 1998 (seven dead and more than a hundred injured), when everything established that the explosion had been caused accidentally.
Six months after the press announced the annulment of the acquittal, the Supreme Court’s decision was finally notified to Pinar Selek’s lawyers on 6 January 2023 by the Istanbul Assize Court.
Increased violence by the Turkish authorities Pinar Selek is the subject of an international arrest warrant requesting her immediate imprisonment. This decision has been taken by the Istanbul Criminal Court even before the judges of this court have given their verdict at the first hearing, scheduled for 31 March 2023.
These measures, which are absurd from a legal point of view and particularly serious in their scope and consequences for Pinar Selek, have been taken against a backdrop of restrictions on freedoms and an increase in violence by the Turkish authorities against all minorities and political opponents, in particular the Kurds, both in Turkey and in other countries. The forthcoming elections in Turkey (including the presidential election in June 2023) are an ideal opportunity for political diversion and manipulation.
The collectives in solidarity with Pinar Selek refuse to allow the writer and sociologist to be held hostage once again to an iniquitous policy that has resulted in a veritable judicial farce. They also refuse to allow her to become a collateral victim of the policy of complacency of European countries towards the authoritarian and repressive regime in Turkey.
French nationality is not enough to protect her.
They call on all members of parliament and politicians who have shown their support for Pinar Selek in recent months to urge the government to provide her with all the security and protection that the French state owes to one of its compatriots.
Pinar Selek’s French nationality is not enough to protect her.Backed by the support of a large number of leading figures from the worlds of research, intellectual life and culture, the collectives in solidarity with Pinar Selek are renewing their request to the President of the Republic for firm and unconditional support, as well as an official protest to the Turkish authorities. Finally, they call on Pinar Selek’s friends, artists, academics and activists to redouble their efforts, to extend their mobilisations in support of all the victims of the Turkish government and to prepare large delegations to travel to Istanbul on 31 March to demand truth and justice for Pinar Selek.
European Coordination of Collectives in Solidarity with Pinar Selek