More than 200 people were taken into custody on December 12 and 13 in Urfa in simultaneous political genocide attacks. Police torture continues in the Anti-terror Unit and the AKP-held Haliliye Municipality’s sports center where the detainees are held since. HDP and DBP Urfa province and district co-chairs, caucus members, DBP co-mayors of Viranşehir and Bozova municipalities, NGO representatives, lawyers and party officials are among the detainees who are subjected to systemic torture.

BATTERED DETAINEES NOT TAKEN TO THE HOSPITAL

Viranşehir co-mayor Emrullah Cin is among those held in the sports center for almost a month. It has come to light that the police said they would “talk with him”, took him outside and tortured and beat him. Rights violations are running rampant in Urfa where the victims of police torture are not allowed to visit hospitals so they can’t get a battery report.

DETENTION CONTINUES DESPITE HEALTH PROBLEMS

The Urfa police has turned the Anti-terror Unit and the AKP municipality’s sports center into torture centers. Lawyers who want to meet with their clients are subjected to insults and attacks by the police. When they insist, the lawyers are also battered. There are people with illnesses among party members and elected officials held in the sports-center-turned-internment-camp and several people have had heart and asthma attacks due to the harsh conditions they are held under. Halfeti Municipality deputy co-mayor Hacı Bazo Yılmaz has reportedly had two attacks due to his heart, blood pressure and asthma conditions.

Urfa MPs Osman Baydemir and İbrahim Ayhan called the matter to attention in the press conference they held in the parliament yesterday on the detentions in Urfa and demanded an immediate end to the unlawful situation at hand.