ANKARA - Politician Zeynep Ölbeci, who is on trial in detention in the Kobanê Case, said: "Me and my friends started a hunger strike to demand that the isolation be abolished and negotiations begin."
Politician Zeynep Ölbeci, who is on trial in detention within the scope of the Kobanê Case, stated that they took part in the hunger strike that has been going on in prisons since November 27 within the scope of the "Freedom for Abdullah Öcalan, solution to the Kurdish issue" campaign. In the letter she sent through her lawyers, Ölbeci stated that she and her fellow prisoners are on hunger strike.
'I CAME TO BE A PART OF PEACE WITH HONOR'
Letter of Ölbeci is as follows: "Hello, dear Kurds, dear socialists, democrats, intellectuals, women and young people who love their country, I greet you wholeheartedly with respect and love. Please do not think that I am giving this greeting because I am a victim or helpless. As a woman who has been on trial in the Kobanê Case for 3 years, I have come to be a part of the honorable struggle for peace, to reach you and meet your struggle for a democratic, equal and free life.
We have left behind the challenging year 2023. 2023 has been one of the years when war was insisted on for someone's benefit and fire fell on our homes every day. Those who support the status quo, those who favor war, understand that the solution to the Kurdish issue is only destruction. However, the negotiation table established in 2013 showed us that the solution to the Kurdish issue is possible by talking, without weapons, and through politics. Great prices were paid for peace, honorable life and unity. But in 2015, the negotiation table was overturned in favor of the status quo and war profiteers for the sake of one-sided, political and economic gain.
AN ESSENTIAL FOR PEACE IS THE REMOVAL OF ISOLATION
Kurd political prisoners, including me, believe that in order to return to the negotiation process and restart peace talks, the heavy isolation of Mr. Abdullah Öcalan should be abolished, and meetings with his lawyer, family and guardian should be held, reminding him of his dominant role in the Kurdish issue. This is essential for peace. We, as Kurds and women; We believed in this, and we put peace at the center of our struggle so that peace could be permanent. On November 27, 2023, as Kurd prisoners, in our indefinite alternating ten-day hunger strike, the abolishing of the isolation imposed on Mr. Öcalan and the re-establishment of the negotiation table for the solution of the Kurdish issue came to the fore as our basic demands.
We call on the entire public to expand the struggle for democratic and free life in line with these demands. Because the source of all the evil we experience is the insistence on war against free and equal life and the democratic nation.
KURDISH ISSUE WILL BE SOLVED THROUGH DEMOCRATİC METHODS
The massacres of women and children, rapes, the hunger and misery faced by the society, the influx of gangs and drug barons from all over the world into the country, on the other hand; This organized evil is the source of why our people cannot find a future in their own country and are scattered all over the world, and why we cannot even cope with the natural disasters we experience. We are not forced or condemned to live under the rule of this organized evil. Based on this truth, our basic need as a society is not to insist on war, but to show the will to solve the Kurdish issue through democratic methods.
WE WENT ON A HUNGER STRIKE TO END THE LOCKDOWN
Me and my friends went on a hunger strike, demanding that the isolation be abolished and negotiations begin. I call on all democratic public opinion to fight stronger to ensure that our just and legitimate demands are realized. I embrace you all with respect and love, with my hope and belief that an honorable peace will come to these lands as soon as possible.”