The families of Kurdish people's leader Abdullah Öcalan and the other prisoners on Imrali applied to the Bursa Chief Public Prosecutor's Office and the Imrali Prison Directorate for a meeting.
There has been no news from Kurdish people's leader Abdullah Öcalan for nearly two years and there is absolute isolation imposed on him.
Abdullah Öcalan’s brother Mehmet Öcalan and his guardian Mazlum Dinç, Ömer Hayri Konar's brother Ali Konar, Hamili Yıldırım's brother Polat Yıldırım and Veysi Aktaş's sister Melihe Çetin applied to the Bursa Chief Public Prosecutor's Office to request a visit to their relatives.
Families also applied to the Directorate of Imrali F Type High Security Closed Penal Institution through the Bursa Chief Public Prosecutor's Office.
Lawyers are requesting to meet with Kurdish people's leader Abdullah Öcalan twice a week. However, applications for visits are systematically left unanswered. In some cases, months later, lawyers are told that disciplinary action has been taken against the Kurdish people's leader and therefore no visit can be granted.
It came out on January 12 that the Bursa Execution Judge’s Office had notified lawyers of a new three-month ban on family visits for Abdullah Öcalan and his fellow prisoners on 4 January. The action was described as a “disciplinary punishment”, the motives and details of which, however, were not mentioned.
Concerns increased after the CPT visit to Imrali
Concerns over the situation of the Kurdish people's leader increased after the Council of Europe Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) visited Turkey on September 20-29. In a statement on 3 October, the CPT announced that Imralı F Type High Security Prison was among the institutions it visited.
However, Asrın Law Office reported that during the CPT visit, there was no meeting with Abdullah Öcalan, and that this increased their concerns. Asrın Law Office said on 29 November: “We have heard that Mr. Öcalan did not see the CPT delegation during its visit to Imrali Island in September 2022.”
