ISTANBUL- INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT AGAINST POLICE TERROR AND CHEMICAL WEAPONS USED AGAINST THE PUBLIC

  • by: Asena Acar
  • recipient: UN Human Rights Council Called to Investigate Police Raid in Turkey

We condemn all excessive and disproportionate use of force!!!

On May 31, the police attacked a group of peaceful demonstrators Friday in Istanbul’s Taksim Square with water cannons and tear gas, sending scores of people, protesters and tourists alike.

Cases were reported on head concussion, broken arm, broken leg and roughly hundred wounds and ecchymosis with tear gas, plastic bullets, and water cannons.

Following the brutal police raids on demonstrators protesting against the demolition of Taksim Gezi Park at the heart of Istanbul, we are concerned about the number of injured in the police raids and the respect for the rights of the protesters.

The police action was the latest violent crackdown by the government against a growing protest movement challenging plans to replace a park in Taksim Square, Istanbul. But while the removal of the park, which is filled with sycamore trees and is the last significant green space in the center of Istanbul, set off the protests at the beginning of the week, the gatherings have broadened into a wider expression of anger against the heavy-handed tactics and urban development plans of the government and its leader, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. His party, now in power a decade, is increasingly viewed by many Turks as becoming authoritarian.

We would like to warn the government on the usage of pepper gas which is considered as chemical weapon and can cause chronic or deadly injuries. This totalitarian government that is even unable to defends its own arguments. There is no difference between casting these pepper gas bombs that may cause deadly injuries due to its content and shooting somebody with a bullet. We are currently experiencing the anxiety of possibly hearing one of citizens killed due to one of these gas bomb bullets. We are calling the government officials to stop these irresponsible practices.

We condemn all excessive and disproportionate use of force!


31 May 2013


Dear UNHRC President Remigiusz Achilles Henczel,


Dear High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay,


As UN Watch stated I am shocked by the Turkish riot police action in the early hours of this morning, when they fired tear gas canisters and used water cannons to violently crush a peaceful sit-in by hundreds of people trying to prevent trees from being uprooted at an Istanbul park.


We urge you to call for an Urgent Debate of the UN Human Rights Council, when it reconvenes on Monday to begin consideration next week of human rights situations that require the Council’s attention.


While Turkish Interior Minister Muammer Guler announced that authorities would investigate, this pledge appears inadequate, insufficient, and insincere, given that he simultaneously defended the crackdown, saying officers were “carrying out their duties” against an “illegal occupation” of the park.


We are alarmed by reports that at least two people—including a journalist—were hit in the head by tear gas canisters, agent orange and bullets. Two opposition legislators were among several (reportedly 2000 Turkish citizens as of June 4, 2013) hospitalized after being affected by the gas.


According to credible reports, the injured journalist, Ahmet Sik, and others were deliberately targeted by police. A Reuters photographer was also injured.


Excellencies, today’s police brutality in Istanbul is only the latest in a series of aggressive and illegal measures cracking down on peaceful protests, with Turkish police routinely resorting to excessive and disproportionate force in breach of the international human rights covenants and commitments to which Turkey is a signatory.


We urge you to take action and thereby uphold the Council’s obligation to promote and protect universal human rights.


Sincerely

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