In Turkey, systematic and wide-spread torture and ill-treatment of political and criminal prisoners in police stations during long incommunicado detentions continue. Political suspects may be detained for 30 days in the provinces under emergency rule, for 15 days in other provinces. According to the Turkish Constitution when anyone is detained at any time his/her family should be informed on the detention. However this in application is not conducted. What is more the detainee is, often, not even registered to the records of the police station, and this time it is not possible to prove or claim that a person is being held under police custody. Any kind of torture techniques are used -electric shocks beatings sexual harassment rape pressurized water Palestine suspension etc. Political prisoners are not allowed to access to a lawyer either.
While dissident people are making speeches or writing articles, and while new dissident journals are allowed to be published as compared to .the previous year’s torture disappearances extrajudicial executions and killings perpetrated by unidentified assailants incredibly increased. Killings by unidentified assailants’ disappearances under detention torture and arbitrary detentions are reportedly being experienced most intensively in the mainly Kurdish populated southeastern provinces under the emergency rule such as Diyarbakir Batman Mardin Van etc. According to the figures of the Human Rights Association while the figure for deaths by torture and extrajudicial execution was 160 in 1993 this figure is 298 in 1994; the figure for disappearances in detention was 32 in 1993 it is 328 in 1994. The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture of the Council of Europe (either in 1992 and 1994) and the UN Committee against Torture (in 1993) had reported the existence of systematic torture in Turkey.
In recent month’s people -mostly the relatives of those who have gone to missings began to raise their great concern about disappearances. The HRA also started a campaign against disappearances (Refer to the Campaign Programmed of the lira).
As long as the national and international human rights organizations raise their concern about disappearances. and as long as the newspapers published in English language in Turkey cover such incidents, popular newspapers and TV channels, which serve to distort the facts and mislead the public, become obliged to make mention about them.
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The HRA reports the applications -both written or oral- around Turkey through its Branches. In the annex there is a sample report concerning the applications in connection with torture, which were made to the Istanbul Branch of the HRA only in 1994.