DHKC Information Bureau (Amsterdam) Statement On Umraniye And It’s Aftermath
This Is Fascism
This Is Istanbul
These Were The People Who Were Massacred But Who Were Never
Defeated
The police arrested 4,000 people. They kidnapped the bodies of the murdered DHKP-C prisoners. On January 4, 1996, 3 DHKP-C prisoners were killed in Umraniye-prison. Two of them, Riza Boybas and Orhan Ozen, were supposed to be buried on January 8, 1996. However, the fascist government showed their disgusting face again: the police forces blocked the streets in Istanbul and arrested 4,000 people to prevent them from attending the funeral of the DHKP-C prisoners. The funeral procession was supposed to start from Alibeykoey/Istanbul, but the police blocked all the streets and began to arrest the people who wanted to join the ceremony. The police used brutal force against the people: elderly people, women and children were beaten by them. The normal police stations were not big enough to keep all of the arrested people: they took a lot of people to the sports arena in the Eyup-neighbourhood. These circumstances remind us of the situation in Chile under the regime of Pinochet, the military coup of March 12, 1970 and the junta of September 12, 1980, in Turkey. Emin Goktepe, a journalist from “Evrensel” paper, was also held in this hall. His tortured body was later found just outside of this building.
Orhan Tasanlar, the chief of police in Istanbul, stated on his first day of office: “I came to Istanbul to chop off the heads”. He is a headhunter, chief of the contra-guerrilla. This is all his doing. The fascist horde even were scared of the dead bodies of our comrades Boybas and Ozen. The police told the families that they could only have a funeral with the relatives and lawyers. The families refused this idea. Thereupon the families and the lawyers were attacked by the police and another group of policemen kidnapped the bodies and buried them. They didn’t even respect the right of the families to have their own ceremony. This is the real and disgusting face of fascism, on January 8, 1996. They were the losers, they were desperate.
“You will see the hope will rise and go on!
Your fear will get to your throat, you’ll see!
And you’re scared of us”
The martyrs of Umraniye already found a warm place in the hearts of our people. Do not be happy, you can not oppress the people, you can not silence their voice with torture, massacres and disappearances. You can not force 60 million people to surrender.
Note: According to our information 3 DHKP-C comrades were killed and more than 50 prisoners were wounded. 4 of them are still in intensive care: their lives are in danger. In other prisons the revolutionary prisoners acted in solidarity and showed their support with the people in Umraniye-prison: tens of guards and a couple of directors were taken hostage. After negotiations between representatives of the prisoners, lawyers from the People’s Justice Bureau, the Progressive Lawyers Association, human rights organisations and the government, all the demands from the prisoners were conceded. According to this deal, there will be no more attacks on the prisons, no transfer of prisoners to other prisons, the wounded prisoners will receive proper medical treatment, and the prisoners are allowed to see their relatives and lawyers again. During the events in the prisons, there was a lot of protest outside the prisons, in Turkey and abroad. These actions are still going on.
