While PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan has been denied permission to meet his lawyers since 27 July 2011, it has emerged that Öcalan was also handed down a 20-day solitary confinement on 29 November 2011.

Asrýn Law Office lawyers made a statement on the situation and remarked that even Öcalan’s most fundamental rights are being used as a tool for political blackmail.

The statement of lawyers about the solitary confinement of Öcalan underlined that the isolation of PKK leader has recently been made heavier. Öcalan’s lawyers said the followings in their statement:

“Besides the visit ban imposed on our client since July  27 for different reasons, Mr. Öcalan is also not allowed to contact the outside world in other ways like sending a letter or telegraph. He still has not answered to our letter dated 16 November in which we asked about his situation but don’t know whether he received or not. Through the prevention of his right to make a phone call or to write a letter, our client, who has virtually no contact with the outside world, is subjected to a regime of total isolation. For five months now we have been unable to know or hear about the situation of Mr. Öcalan and our other five clients who are held prisoner in the island. The latest notification we received from our clients was the fax sent by our client Cumali Karsu who told us about the severe conditions they have been subjected to. As well as the solitary confinement imposed on Mr. Öcalan since 29 November, our client Karsu also told us that their earlier disciplinary punishments (to be restrained from some activities) have been implemented in the most recent period.”