DEVRİMCİ HALK KURTULUŞ CEPHESİ
Date: December 29, 2004 Statement: 346
A flame in Taksim: Sergul Hatice Albayrak
The 118th heroine, who did not give in to the isolation policy of the EU and the AKP!
You who practise a policy of isolation,
You who defend isolation
You, who simply ignore the 117 dead..
On December 26, 2004, a young woman of 26 set herself on fire in the middle of Taksim Square, Istanbul. Her name was Sergul Hatice Albayrak. But Sergul was not suffering from depression. She had not been abandoned by a lover. Nor was it due to a situation in her life that was hopeless… Therefore the people in Turkey working in the oligarchic media were unable to read anything from the self-immolation of this young woman. It had no media value and there was nothing in it that they could use to exploit the people’s emotions.
Sergul Albayrak had a sign in her hands saying “[Prison] isolation must be abolished” when she set fire to herself. She had been active for 154 days already in the Death Fast resistance opposing isolation. She began her resistance in the prison of Usak. Two weeks ago, she was released from custody, but continued the action outside prison.
ISOLATION is a forbidden subject in the bourgeois press. A ban was imposed on reporting the DEATH FAST resistance.
An attempt is always being made to hide the four years of isolation tyranny behind the darkness of censorship. We were burned alive in the prisons but they did not report that. We died behind the thick walls of the F-Type prisons, in their isolation cells on the Death Fast, but they did not report that either. We have burned ourselves in the middle of Istanbul, in Taksim Square and again they have not reported it.
What will it take before they finally pay it attention? Does the fire have to break out in newspaper offices or TV studios, or in the offices of government ministries? That is actually not necessary. This fire spreads anyway in the ministries, in the offices of the chief editors and in the parliament. What are you waiting for? Until you catch fire too?
Our comrade Sergul Albayrak, who set herself on fire on December 26, 2004, at about three in the afternoon in front of the Ataturk Culture Centre in Taksim itself ignited, died on the 28th at about 2.45 in the afternoon.
But do not think that the fire has gone out.
The fire that was ignited in Taksim burns even more strongly now. This fire closes in slowly on those who have carried out isolation politics. It grips those that that tried to impose isolation cells, calling them “rooms” or “European standards”. It grips those who ignore the 117 deaths. And it grips the political left who under the sway of Europe have trampled their own values underfoot. If they do not sense it today, then tomorrow, or sometime in the future the fire will surely burn them!
The fire in Taksim was an answer to ISOLATION, the EU and the AKP!
[the “moderate Islamist“ party forming Turkey’s government] European imperialism and the oligarchy in Turkey jointly designed the cells for the F-Type prisons. They have jointly implemented isolation. It was your goal to dissuade us from the views we hold. You wanted to destroy our patriotism, and our revolutionary and socialist world view.
We have died 118 times for our views, but we have not and will not abandon them. We say you cannot force us either with the flames that arose from Sergul’s body, nor with prison isolation!
With Sergul we say this country belongs to us and we will not leave it to imperialism. We will not become defenders of capitulating to imperialism. Sergul was one of our youth who grew up in Europe. She became acquainted with the term HOMELAND and PEOPLES when she became a supporter of the front (DHKC).
And now she teaches a lesson on the subject of patriotism. She teaches our entire people the lesson. She demonstrates that those who do not fight for their country and for its independence from imperialism and are not ready to sacrifice themselves can be no true patriots.
The government is in the hands of traitors to the country. The traitors, who appear in Iraq as defenders of the Americans and in Brussels as advocates of the EU, are trying to extinguish the battle for independence in this country.
And there Sergul steps forward and calls out in Taksim Square: “we have not surrendered.. We did not want our country sold piece by piece to the Americans and Europeans.
We did not want our peoples exposed to hunger and poverty. So we have resisted. That is what I am dying for.”
She is a socialist fighter for independence. From Taksim she calls out: this country belongs to us, we will not leave it to imperialism and its collaborators!
She was a flame that descended upon the December 17 agreement between the EU and the AKP (Turkey. Our comrade who set fire to herself in Taksim reveals the tyranny that conceals itself behind the joint “democracy game” being played by the EU and the AKP. EU imperialism and the imperialist servant, the AKP are the murderers of Sergul and 118 revolutionaries.
The fire in Taksim is an answer to the loss of left-wing values and ideologies.
Sergul Albayrak was a 26-year-old Marxist-Leninist. She was a socialist who knew that someone, who does not fight for the revolution is not a socialist. She was a revolutionary who knew, that it is impossible to fight for the revolution without looking death in the eye for the sake of the battle against imperialism and the oligarchy for the liberation of the peoples… On the one hand there is Sergul and people like her. On the other are all those tread underfoot the values and culture of the left. “Left”, “socialist ” and even “communist” covers are used to support EU policies, the election and democracy game of the oligarchy, and these words are spoken by the bourgeoisie in favour of the liquidation of the revolution by the imperialism and the oligarchy. Lunatics who write insults against revolutionaries and the resistance, are described as heroes by certain circles who claim to be “left-wing”. “Intellectuals” whose only goal is it to find a profile within the system and will even whitewash the oligarchy if necessary, give the left advice. With fairy tales like “life is holy” or “we are against every form of violence”, they recommend surrender to imperialism and the oligarchy.
Sergul Albayrak gives an answer to these fraudulent leftists.
She is also an answer to those who say “We stressed our differences. It is good that we did,” “We are not of the same type” and who talk of “international standards”, all in an attempt to avoid resisting.
She is an answer to those who give into the system by saying “life is holy”, who write novels which insult revolutionaries and to betrayal. She is an answer to those who rejoiced believing we were destroyed and who lurked in corners waiting for us to be exterminated.
Where are these “leftists” when our country is being sold piece for piece, our people die or are murdered in the isolation cells, executed or tortured? What system haven have they crawled into, against whom are they crafting their plans for extermination?
We are here.
We are in the isolation cells with red cloths tied around our foreheads. We are the fires burning in Taksim Square. We die for the revolution. We fight for the revolution. He who is not in this battle, has no authorisation to be called a revolutionary, socialist or communist! We will teach them of the revolutionary identity and the resistance they have forgotten and distorted. They will learn from that or will cease slandering our people and insulting our values.
Our resistance, that we continue in its 5th year with the determination of our comrade Sergul is the epic of those who die but are invincible, who declare that this country belongs to us!
With the resistance fire that our comrades have not allowed to go out in its 5th year, we reduce to debris and ashes the illusions of imperialism and the oligarchy that they can eliminate the drive for independence, socialism and revolution in our country. These illusions are in vain.
What are the revolutionaries, democrats and patriots in our country waiting for before uniting in the framework of this resistance.
To our peoples! You are under heavy siege. The imperialists and its collaborators in our country use every means in order to keep you away from reality and from the struggle for your rights and freedoms. They censor, torture, cause degeneration and use prohibitions.
Before Hatice Sergul Albayrak set herself on fire on Taksim Square, she wrote a letter headed “to our people” : It says: “our people.. WE ARE DYING FOR YOU!.. For I love you so much that I could die for you. Our people, the problem is a very basic one. What does isolation mean? Why do these young people die?
Find it out! If you learn to understand people like Sergul, then you will understand the reality of this country. If you know people like Sergul, you will see how lies mark your lives. And the more people like Sergul there are the closer will be the end of the system of exploitation and oppression. They defend independence as opposed to imperialism, democracy against fascism, socialism against capitalism. They fight in order to overthrow the government of the oligarchy and set up people’s power. Independence, democracy and socialism are our liberation. The fire that Sergul lit in Taksim when she sacrificed herself, is the light of our liberation.
*** Sergul Hatice Albayrak: “Turks, Laz, Cherkess, Kurds, Georgians, Sunnis and Alevis, I die for you, the peoples of all nationalities and beliefs.”
Our comrade Sergul Albayrak was born on May 30, 1978 in Bad Urach in the Federal Republic of Germany. She grew up there, went to school and began revolutionary life. Before she became a revolutionary her life was not very different from that ärin, its life did not differ much too much of that of our youth, whom we term as being more or less a “third generation” living abroad. In other words, a young person who was losing her identity and did not know what culture she belonged to, while bearing the imprint of the bourgeoisie’s distorted idea of “freedom”. During this “youth” phase, in which she was torn away from her family under the “a free life” and was smoking hashish, but by chance she came o know a family of Front sympathisers. This was a turning point in her life. She had strong willpower. As the true significance of “freedom” came to her she did not find it difficult to reject what imperialism was trying to force on her. She learned quickly. She quickly became a revolutionary. In the city, in which she was located, there were not many Front activities. She began to put her experience into practice. As a result of major effort and work there were dozens of supporters of the Front in her area. She took on various organisational tasks and responsibilities. Sergul rejected the “possibilities” and “freedoms” that European imperialism offered her, and became a revolutionary. Those, who only go on about joining the EU and distort revolutionary theory in order to justify the defence of EU policies still much to learn from Sergul. Both in the political and in the moral sense.
When she came to Turkey in August 1997 while acting as a courier, she was arrested in Tokat. She was raped during a torture session. After her arrest, she spent time in the prisons of Ulucanlar, Sakarya, Canakkale and Usak. For her the enemy was now no abstract and theoretical being, but rather a concrete reality through their torturing, homicidal and tyrannical character. In seven years of captivity, she was always at the centre of resistance. During the December 19 massacre [in 2000] she was at the prison of Canakkale. With her comrades at her side she came a hail of bombs and bullets. Her comrades were killed in front of her. From the beginning she volunteered in order to continue the struggle of her fallen comrades. She made efforts to join one of the Death Fast teams. This was itself a lengthy battle and her wish was realised on July 24, 2004 when she was in Usak E-Type Prison. She took part in the 11th Death Fast Team named after Sevgi Erdogan.
Sergul Albayrak was released on December 13, 2004 from Usak Prison. She was outside now. In our country, in which some climbed over the corpses of their comrades and committed treason to get out of prison, that some over the corpses of its comrade climbed and commit is reverently” neglected become treason in order to escaped the prison and abused all their values with statements like “life is holy”, they received an unmistakeable answer to their treason from Sergul. She decided to transform her 154 days of continuous Death Fast resistance into a sacrifice action. On December 26, she set herself on fire and became a voice of those who do not give in to isolation and capitulation, who die but cannot be defeated, who say, “this country belongs to us” and who never give up the flag of revolution and socialism.
Those that implement and defend the policy of prison isolation will pay a reckoning for our 118 martyrs! The fire that was ignited by Sergul will never go out!
