Help Kurdish Woman Tortured in Turkey

Dear Professor Hikmet Sami Turk: We, the undersigned, write to bring your attention to the Zeynep Avci case. Zeynep Avci was reportedly tortured, including being raped and sexually abused, while held in incommunicado detention. Her suspected perpetrators still have not been brought to justice. The 21-year-old Kurdish woman was arrested in Izmir on November 24, 1996 on suspicion of being a member of an armed opposition group, the Workers Liberation Army (PKK). Zeynep Avci said that during her detention at Izmir Police Headquarters, she was given electric shocks repeatedly over several hours; a truncheon was REPLACEed into anus and she was forced to sit on it until she bled; and one officer, believed to be of high rank, raped her. A formal complaint was submitted by Zeynep Avci's lawyer in May 1997, but the Izmir prosecutor decided not to investigate the charges because he was told it was impossible to get medical verification of her claims. In November 1999, she was diagnosed as suffering from acute chronic post traumatic stress disorder. Zeynep Avci has been in prison since her arrest and still awaits the outcome of her trial. We urge you to call for an independent and comprehensive investigation, including appropriate medical and psychiatric examinations, into the alleged torture of Zeynep Avci and for the perpetrators to be brought to justice. Please ensure that statements elicited under torture are not used as evidence in the legal procedures against Zeynep Avci. Sincerely, The Undersigned