The conference titled “Peace and Stability in the Middle East through the ideas of Abdullah Öcalan” in Southern Kurdistan’s Sulaimani city continues.

The conference organised by Academy of Politics and Democratic Thought in Southern Kurdistan is attended by 150 delegates from four parts of Kurdistan and other countries.

After the first session earlier today, the second session is witnessing a discussion of resolution proposals by politicians, NGO representatives and politics experts in line with the ideas of Kurdish People's Leader Abdullah Öcalan.

A panel titled “Behind the Scenes in the International Conspiracy Against Abdullah Öcalan"was held during the morning's session in the conference.

HDP Co-Vice Chair Aysel Tuğluk moderated the session titled “Isolation Against Öcalan and the İmralı System”. International Peace Initiative member Judge Essa Moosa, HDP Ankara MP Sırrı Süreyya Önder and AHB (Century's Law Office) lawyer Rezan Sarıca made presentations in this session.

TUĞLUK: İMRALI SYSTEM MUST BE ABOLISHED

HDP Co-Vice Chair Aysel Tuğluk, also a lawyer for Öcalan, said there has taken place a particular practice and torture system that is totally unlawful with regards to the domestic and international law since Öcalan was first brought to the İmralı prison.

Tuğluk stressed that no meetings are being held with Öcalan at the moment and there is no information available as to under which circumstances he is being held. She said it is the will of the Kurdish people that is being kept in isolation, and defended that the İmralı system must be abolished, describing the demand for Öcalan's freedom as a conscientious and moral duty.

Speaking after, Asrın Law Office lawyer Rezan Sarıca talked about the İmralı System, stating that the Kurdish leader has made "sacred efforts" for the sake of a democratic resolution amid an ever-increasing pressure and isolation in prison that involves solitary confinement, arbitrary practice, physical intervention, threat and psychological pressure.

Sarıca noted that Öcalan's lawyers have been making efforts to meet him in İmralı for five years but that they have been facing a never-ending obstruction as his isolation has now extended to the point of isolation of the Kurdish cities and towns. He added that they were now facing "various practices of the coup dynamics".

Sarıca warned that there will be no return to the democratic resolution process unless the existing multidimensional attacks are defeated through a multidimensional resistance.

MOOSA: THE ISOLATION ON ÖCALAN IS WORSE THAN THAT OF MANDELA

Nelson Mandela's lawyer and International Peace and Reconciliation Initiative member Judge Essa Moosa spoke after Sarıca.

Moosa said there were striking similarities between the struggle of Nelson Mandela and that of Abdullah Öcalan, noting that the isolation imposed on Öcalan is, however, much worse that that imposed on Mandela who was held together with other political prisoners. He stated that the isolation in İmralı is against the international law.

Moosa talked about his first meeting with Öcalan, and consequently the Kurdish struggle, after a Kurdish delegation went to South Kurdistan before he was put into captivity.