Turkish government officials announced plans to force the suspects jailed for alleged coup attempt to wear prison uniforms after a suspect appeared before court with a t-shirt that read “Hero”. Several politicians including Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan supported the move in response.

A prominent human rights activist, Human Rights Association’s (IHD) Gülseren Yoleri, slammed the government's plans and said a unified prisoner appearance policy for coup suspects will be a threat to all prisoners.

“If a prisoner is tortured, doesn't matter who he/she is, all prisoners will be under threat of torture” she said.

IHD WAS FOUNDED AGAINST THE PRISON UNIFORM POLICY

Speaking to ANF, Yoleri, head of IHD’s Istanbul branch and a lawyer, has represented families of the disappeared persons and victims of abuse and torture by the police or soldiers for years.

Recalling that IHD was founded on 17 July 1986 with the goal of stopping the torture and prison uniform policy imposed on prisoners in 1980 military coup period, Yoleri said struggle against prison uniforms is one of the reasons why IHD was founded at the first place.

“We always questioned the sincerity of AKP’s advocacy for democracy. They always claimed to be defending human rights but consistenly violated it. We never trusted them and history proved us right” she said.

VIOLENCE IS ON THE RISE AFTER LAST YEAR’S COUP ATTEMPT

According to Yoleri, after EU’s decision to freeze accession talks, Turkish government totally gave up its human rights rhetoric and the people of Turkey are now facing a government which only demands justice for its supporters.

Yoleri pointed out the rise of violence and rhetoric defending violence after the attempted coup of last year and cited decapitation of the coup suspects as an example.

“That morning those people were executed and the government defended them. Then they started discussing about capital punishment and also defended torture in prisons. With statutory decrees, custody periods were extended and this way the government created an environment for torture. Now they take a step further, talking about prison uniform and decapitation of coup suspects. These all point to the evolution of a fascist regime” she said.

PRISON UNIFORM POLICY IS A THREAT TO THE WHOLE SOCIETY

Yoleri remarked that IHD will continue to struggle against this oppressive politics and added “If torture is used against one prisoner, it will be used against all the others. If the coup suspects are forced to wear the prison uniforms all other prisoners will be forced to wear it.”

Yoleri called for a struggle against prison uniforms plan, adding: “If rule of law is eliminated all people will be effected. If you remain silent against an unlawful act because its against a certain group, you have to know that this unlawfulness will be extended to all social and political groups tomorrow. Therefore the government's prison uniform plan is a threat to the society and we should resist against it.”