DEVRİMCİ HALK KURTULUŞ CEPHESİ
Date: January 2, 2001 Statement: 143
THE STATE IS CONTINUING TO SLAUGHTER RIZA POYRAZ WAS MARTYRED, STRIKING A BLOW AT THE FACE OF IMMORALITY AND LIES
On December 19, as in all the other prisons, the state attacked Umraniye Prison with bullets and bombs. For days the heroes of our resistance gave martyrs and are continuing to give them.
They were the representatives of honour and justice. They said, we are dying rather than live without honour. And they died. And they are continuing to die. They resist and die but they do not surrender. They are the bravest that has ever been seen on the soil of this land. Our comrade Riza Poyraz, who was wounded by the state’s bullets in Umraniye Prison, was martyred on January 1 in Haydarpasa Numune hospital.
The Justice Minister’s shamelessness and impudence in saying before the eyes of millions that “the state killed nobody by shooting them or setting them on fire” was dealt a blow in the face by Riza Poyraz’s martyrdom. The murderous state is helpless. Every day the failure of the resistance to end makes it helpless and it seeks to encircle the resistance with lies. But the resistance does not end. The most shameless tortures are being practised in the ‘F’ Type prisons, but still the esistance does not end. In all the ‘F’ Type Nazi camps, in the hospitals, in Kartal, in Usak, in Kutahya, the resistance is continuing under torture.
With this belief, this resolve, we will also destroy the ‘F’ Type Nazi camps. Those who do not believe this should examine the September 12 junta years: they should look at the Special Type and ‘E’ Type prisons. The ‘F’ Type prisons will get to know us. The Hikmet Sami Turks (name of the current Justice Minister) will also get to know us.
WE ARE FIGHTING AGAINST AN ENEMY WHO HAS MADE LIES AND IMMORALITY INTO A PRINCIPLE
Today millions of people are grasping the meaning of these words. The enemy fights with the most shameless, impudent and immoral lies. The enemy tells lies, slaughters and then tells more lies. The enemy is trying to stay on his feet with lies and terror because he can give the people nothing. The enemy is trying to cover up his helplessness in the face of the resistance with new lies and censorship. And he is sinking even further. This state is exhausted and finished. Its only weapon is terror and demagogy. In the history of the peoples, no state has remained on its feet for long based on terror and demagogy. Because the government is taking orders from the IMF, it is impoverishing its own people, and that is why this government cannot live long.
THE STATE AND US:
The state slaughters, practises tyranny, bans and destroys. We are defending rights, freedoms and democracy at the cost of our own deaths. The state is selling everything to imperialism and the IMF. our soil, our people’s future and our honour. We are fighting against imperialism. For decades we have been slaughtered for resisting imperialism. The state is the representative of immorality, lies and hypocrisy. We stand for morality and honour. We are the heirs of the Pir Sultans, the Bedrettins and the Kara Yilans on the soil of Anatolia who did not bow their heads (these are rebels in the history of medieval Anatolia). We are the ones who keep our word.
Yes, we will run this country.
We will run this country with our heroism.
We will run our country with this ideology and morality.
We will run this country with this belief and resolve.
Riza POYRAZ
Comrade Riza was born in 1971 in Dagonu village, Kangal, Sivas. He grew up in Gazi District (Istanbul), where he moved as a child. (Gazi is a shantytown in Istanbul where there are a lot of revolutionaries.) In Gazi he met both the revolutionaries and the state. He saw the struggle that the people waged there in the impoverished shantytown. When he was young he worked in textile workshops. He grew up with a lot of people who became martyrs of the Front. Until he became more involved with our movement he was a modest supporter of the Front. He read, investigated and observed. He asked himself and questioned life as to why it was necessary to make revolution, and then he decided to join our struggle in an organised form. He dreamed of being a guerrilla. During his military service he was preparing himself to be a guerrilla and tried to find out how to cope with the climactic conditions. In 1998 he remained in contact with our movement. He started to do his duty in Istanbul and a short while later he was captured. The torturers were not able to endure his resistance. They threw Riza from the 5th floor of the Istanbul Security Department on Vatan Avenue. His legs were broken. When he was in Umraniye Prison he continued to learn and develop. You can see in Riza’s life and behaviour his devotion to his comrades, his people and their culture. He was to the forefront at the barricades on the day of the massacre. He was wounded there by gendarmerie bullets. He was martyred in hospital.
He explained what it is to be part of an organisation when he was already part of it:
“To be part of an organisation it is necessary to have belief, consciousness and a capacity for self-sacrifice. You need devotion from within. If we see ourselves like this and have this inside us there is no difficulty in overcoming problems. I saw how our country was being sold and our people impoverished. And seeing that, I also have to know how to be an obstacle to it. If this fire of rebellion bursts into flame on the mountain peaks, and if people are welcoming death and dancing halays (Anatolian folk dance) despite the gun barrels pointed at them, I should be obstinate in taking up and holding my position against the enemy, chanting tililis (a trilling noise made at weddings and funerals, especially in Kurdistan. As with the halay, it can have a suggestion of opposition to the system in Turkey). I have to sing our songs obstinately in the face of the enemy, and fearlessly I must march against the accursed enemy.”
Comrade Riza marched fearlessly against the accursed enemy. He marched against the murderers the way someone from Gazi should march.
THE RESISTANCE CONTINUES WITH MARTYRS!
THE STATE CONTINUES TO MASSACRE!
THE PRISONERS CONTINUE TO RESIST!
