CoE : Dramatic Rise of Prisoners' number in Turkey !

    The stern warning was launched by CoE since in a Report written in 2009, but authorized for publication only on 2011 by the Turkish Government. The trend is however confirmed also by a more recent, 2011 Report by another CoE's monitoring body, CLRAE (see infra).

    This recent trend "has resulted in Overcrowding in Many Turkish Prisons" :

F.ex.,  "at the time of the visit (2009), the total Number of Prisoners in Turkey was DOUBLE that of January 2006" (sic !!).

It "reached 112,000, (and on 2011 : 120.000 : See infra) while the official capacity of the entire prison estate was 104,323" only.  

+ " At the same time, the  proportion of Remand prisoners had further increased to some +54%.  

Indeed, according to an even more recent CoE Report, published last week by CLRAE : 

More largely, "over Half (+ 50%) of Turkey’s Prison Population of nearly 120,000, are Unconvicted remand Prisoners", denounced recently in Strasbourg CoE's watchdog for Local/Regional Democracy, CLRAE.

- "Consequently",  "the (Turkish) Prison and Court systems" are "Overloaded", "producing a situation which has a Disproportionately OPPRESSIVE effect on ...those held as (simple) Suspects", CLRAE's 2011 Report denounced, as far as Human Rights in general are concerned in Turkey, taking into account ECHR's and other "independent" CoE's monitoring bodies' recent findings.

"Drawing upon existing legal sources in the ECHR's jurisprudence, and independent commentaries on the human rights situation in Turkey", CLRAE's Rapporteurs "are aware that the current difficulties derive from a mixture of factors including: Broadly drawn definitions of offences in the criminal code, the (over "Zealousness of the police and prosecution authorities, the readiness of courts to imprison on remand for periods of up to two or three years pending trial", the 2011 CLRAE Report denounced.-
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After a 2 Years Delay, the Turkish Government accepted, at last, in 2011, the publication of CPT's Report from its 2009 visit to check Turkish Prisons.

CPT had been cought almost "sleeping" by a 1996 succesful campaign of Hunger Strikes by Prisoners, whose condition had been denounced even by the President of CoE's Parliamentary Assembly, ChristianDemocrat German MEP,  Leni Fischer, followed also by several MEPs at EU Parliament, whose combined reactions, published then by 1st page Headlines in the Press, (including by "EuroFora"s co-founder) had contributed to immediately Stop imminent Deaths, and save many Human Lives. (See relevant 1996 Publication).
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    Re-visiting several controversial "E" or "F-type Prisons" in Turkey, CPT found, f.ex. that :

- "Erzurum E-type Prison has been in operation since 1989 as ...With an official capacity of 700 places, the prison was accommodating 818 prisoners at the time of the visit (including 35 women and 39 juveniles)"

- "Konya E-type Prison, located some 20 km outside Konya, was constructed in the late 1980s. The establishment’s initial capacity of 650 places was later expended to 800 by increasing the number of beds in the existing living units. At the time of the visit, the prison was holding 919 prisoners, including 40 adult women and 36 minors".

- "  Kırıkkale F-type Prison entered into service in 2007. With an official capacity of 368, the establishment was holding 285 prisoners at the time of the visit, mostly sentenced adult male prisoners serving long-term sentences (including life imprisonment) ....while some fifty inmates were held alone", (i.e. in controversial Isolation).

 "Nonetheless, the CPT maintains its reservations about the Isolation-type regime generally applied to prisoners sentenced to aggravated life imprisonment"; the latest Report warns.
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=> "Many of the prisons visited by the delegation were Overcrowded, barely coping with the ever-Increasing prison population", CPT denounces.

"This often led to cramped and unhygienic accommodation, reduced out-of-cell activities, overburdened health-care services, and increased tension – and hence potentially more Violence – between prisoners and between prisoners and staff".
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WORSENING :

    - "the sharp increase in the prison population appears to be the result of various Recent legislative measures," taken by the Turkish Government, CPT denounces :
" such as the adoption of new Criminal and Criminal Procedure Codes and the Law on the Execution of Sentences and Security Measures. In this connection, the waiting period for conditional release has been increased from 2/5 to 2/3 of the prison term and, more generally, Longer prison terms have been introduced for certain types of offence. Further, the maximum period of remand detention for ordinary offences has been Extended from 10 to 18 months.  The delegation also noted that the slow pace of judicial proceedings often led to extremely long periods of remand detention", (etc).
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    On conditions of detention, CPT obsereves f.ex. that, " it is a matter of grave concern that the detention centre in Van was apparently accommodating as many as 289 detainees at the end of August, and 118 detainees at the end of September 2009". becase,  Given the limited space available and the poor material conditions prevailing in the centre (see paragraphs 39 and 46), such levels of overcrowding are totally Unacceptable."     

    F.ex., "During its brief visit to Batman M-type Prison, the delegation was struck by the conditions under which juveniles were being held. 22 juveniles were crammed together in one living unit with only six beds and twelve mattresses placed on the floor. In addition, the unit was poorly ventilated"

    +  Moreover, "both Erzurum and Konya E-type Prisons were affected by overcrowding at the time of the visit, which inevitably had a negative impact on the living conditions of prisoners. It was evident that conditions in living units could on occasion be cramped, especially after the locking of the courtyard door ... Further, several living units at Konya Prison were found to be holding more prisoners than the number of beds available, with some inmates having to sleep on mattresses on the floor", (etc).

    ++ In addition, " the rapid rise in the prison population over recent years not only had serious consequences for the prisoners’ living conditions, but also strained the capacity of all services provided for prisoners. In the case of health care, this factor was compounded by a dramatic shortage of  health-care staff, and notably of doctors. The delegation noted with grave concern that, in the prison system as a whole, only 66 out of the 270 posts for prison doctors were filled at the time of the visit"...

    "Numerous complaints were received about delays in gaining access to a doctor and the quality of treatment and care provided. It became apparent that consultations often lasted no more than one or two minutes and were sometimes carried out in the corridors of the prison. Further, it appeared that many requests for a consultation were followed by a prescription for medicine without the prisoner being seen by a doctor. Moreover, it was a usual practice in prisons for medication to be distributed by prison staff with no training in health care"

    => " To sum up, health care for prisoners, which was already found to be inadequate in many prisons during previous visits of the CPT, was at the time of the 2009 visit close to collapse. There was, as a result, serious and widespread neglect of prisoners’ health, with significant harmful effects", CPT strongly denounces.
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    Tragically, the only general reply by Ankara was to claim that a " 5-year ...plan covering the years 2009-2014, ...aims at reaching a capacity of 142,099 Prisoners by the end of 2014", i.e. augment even more the already Huge Number of Persons deprived of their Liberty !...

    Naturally, CPT observes, critically, that "providing additional accommodation is not likely, in itself, to provide a lasting solution to the problem of overcrowding" of Turkish Prisons recently. A real Solution "implies, in the first place, an emphasis on Non-custodial measures"...and, in the second place, (to) facilitate the reintegration into free society"; according to CoE's well estabished principles.
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+ Moreover :

- In " Chief Prosecutor’s Office in Diyarbakır, (CPT)'s delegation was Denied Access to 2 investigation Files relating to the alleged ill-treatment of detained persons by police officers". But, "nothing can justify an outright refusal to grant access to information which is relevant to the Committee's activities", CoE's body denounced.

+ "Further, at Ağrı Detention Centre for Foreigners, repeated attempts were made by police officers to Obstruct the delegation’s work by providing explanations which subsequently proved to be incorrect. By way of example, misleading information was given on the number of detainees held during the previous weeks", and "the register ....had not been produced by the end of the visit", .

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- "Verbal Abuse" and "Striking" of "Persons deprived of their Liberty" by Policemen "throughout Turkey", is "not acceptable" and must be "punished", CPT also underlined

- "a number of credible allegations" that criminal suspects detained in the Anti-Terror Department at the Diyarbakır Police Headquarters had repeatedly been subjected to Sleep Deprivation during their stay in police Custody", in order "to wear down the resistance of suspects to questioning and to obtain confessions from them".  But, "Any resort to deliberate sleep deprivation of detained persons is not acceptable. It should also be noted that such a practice is prohibited "

         F.ex. "persons concerned were being taken from their cells to be interviewed during the night – as late as 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning – after having already been interviewed for most of the previous day. One man had been interviewed for more than six hours between 2.05 a.m. and 8.17 a.m. on 4 June. His next interview started at 8.40 a.m. and he was then subjected to a further nine interviews for a total of eight hours and fifty minutes between that time and 8.50 a.m. the following day, 5 June, including one interview that began at 3.19 a.m. and lasted until 5.02 a.m."  
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    Moreover, "In particular in the Diyarbakır area, several detained persons ....claimed that they had verbally complained to a prosecutor and/or judge about instances of ill-treatment by law enforcement officials, but that their interlocutors had shown little interest and had taken no further action on the matter". Or, " failing to do so will contribute to creating a climate of impunity ", CPT denounced. " a failure to conduct an effective investigation into allegations of ill-treatment constitutes a violation of Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights", CPT warned.
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    + In addition, "several detained persons claimed that they had not been allowed to meet their lawyer in private before the first questioning".

    On "Medical" care, "CPT ... stresses that its findings were Disturbing :
-In the vast majority of cases, law enforcement officials were present during the (Medical) examinations; the person concerned had no opportunity to speak with the doctor in private; the actual examination was cursory or non-and the conclusions were often summarised in two or three words ..... Moreover, some doctors even talked of being afraid of criminal suspects or expressed a clear prejudice against such persons. Further, in a number of cases, the requirement that the report drawn up at the end of custody be transmitted to the public prosecutor in a closed and sealed envelope, was not complied with. It is also a matter of concern that it was not uncommon for detained persons to remain Handcuffed during medical examinations (on occasion, even handcuffed to the escorting police officer)" !

    + CPT also "was Puzzled to learn that in several detention centres visited (in particular, at Istanbul-Kumkapı and Kirklareli), all Correspondence was systematically Censored" : ..For this purpose, letters written in foreign languages were first translated into Turkish before they were passed on to the addressee. In the CPT’s view, there can be no reasonable justification for such a systematic practice", they warn.
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    + Concerning illegal Immigrants, CPT reveals that "since the 1990s, the CPT has repeatedly received reports from various sources that foreign nationals had been deported from Turkey to a neighbouring country -in particular, Greece (i.e. to the EU), Iran or Iraq-by being compelled by law enforcement officials to cross the border to that country illegally in rural areas. During and after the 2009 visit, the CPT again received accounts of informal deportations of foreign nationals from Turkey to Iran and Iraq. By way of example, the Committee recently received a communication from an Iranian national who claimed that, despite the fact that he had been recognised as refugee by UNHCR and that the procedure for resettlement to a third country was pending with the consulate of that country, he was subjected to an informal deportation to Iran" !

(../..)

(NDLR : DraftNews, due to be updated asap by more accurate and complete NewsReports)

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