Diyarbakır prison to become museum
The Amed [Diyarbakır] Metropolitan Municipality is to take a concrete step towards opening the notorious Diyarbakır Prison as a museum by opening the Diyarbakır Prison Coordination Centre on 18 May.
The Amed [Diyarbakır] Metropolitan Municipality is to take a concrete step towards opening the notorious Diyarbakır Prison as a museum by opening the Diyarbakır Prison Coordination Centre on 18 May.
The Amed [Diyarbakır] Metropolitan Municipality is to take a concrete step towards opening the notorious Diyarbakır Prison as a museum by opening the Diyarbakır Prison Coordination Centre on 18 May.
The Amed municipality is leading efforts to turn the Diyarbakır Prison into a museum. The Diyarbakır Prison Coordination Centre will open in the Sümerpark Joint Life Space. Necati Pirinççioğlu, the chair of the Municipality’s Local Economy Consolidation Office, said that the people of the city wanted to see the prison, where terrible brutality had taken place, become a place where the past could be confronted. Pirinççioğlu added that the Diyarbakır Prison Truth Research and Justice Commission had been carrying out work on this since 2008.
Pirinççioğlu said that in 2011 a petition had collected signatures calling for the prison to be turned into a museum and that the petition had been sent to the Parliamentary Commission. Pirinççioğlu added that the central government had adopted a positive attitude to the decision to turn the prison into a museum.
Necati Pirinççioğlu added that the municipality had carried out discussions with various institutions, such as the 78’liler Foundation, TUHAD-FED, MEYADER, the IHD, Bar Association and TMMOB, after which they had decided to establish the Coordination Centre.
Coordination Centre will open on 18 May
Pirinççioğlu said the Diyarbakır Prison Coordination Centre would open in the Sümerpark Joint Life Space on 18 May, and that some of those who had seen the savagery that took place in the prison would attend the opening ceremony at 4pm.
Pirinççioğlu said there would be an exhibition explaining why the prison should be turned into a museum. “In order for the prison to become a museum it is necessary for a local authority to play a leading role. Therefore the municipality has mobilised, and by providing this site has shown how much importance it attaches to the project,” he added.
He said they had spoken to a total of 517 former inmates of Diyarbakır Prison, and that at the centre they would carry our practical work regarding what form the museum would take.