Guards in İstanbul’s Silivri prison pricked sewing needles to a female convict after she chanted slogans and refused to obey the management’s order to stay in a holding cell, according to her lawyer.
In the light of massive arrests and detentions of the Gülen movement sympatizers, Turkish government has been relocating some prisoners in order to make space for new comers.
One of those relocated convicts, identified only by initials S.A., got needle sticks after she chanted slogans and disobeyed the order to get back to holding cells from the courtyard.
“Her head was hit to the walls which led her to bleed from nose. They also squeezed her breasts until some body liquid leaked from her nipples,” Halkın Hukuk Bürosu law office told Turkish media. The prisoener was ultimately saved from further persecution with the help of other inmates, the office maintained.
Another prisoner known by initials K.S. was hurt after guards pushed her to the floor while her hands were cuffed behind.
Her right wrist has substantially swollen and the swelling has yet to go down despite two days have passed, the office said adding that her wrist might have been broken.
In response to the allegations of torture, prison management underlined the guards are all male as the prison is also for men.
“This is men’s prison so our guards are men. We are not responsible for what is happening,” the head of Silivri prison’s District 9 was quoted as saying.
Allegations of torture and other maltreatment of detainees in Turkey have substantially increased in the recent past.
“Police officers grabbed my personnel card, burned it and dripped it through my legs. I was tortured for two days,” Adnan Kümek, a reporter for the government-targeted Azadiya Welat newspaper told the DİHA news agency on Saturday.
Meanwhile, people detained as part of the Gülen movement are also reported to have been tortured. Amnesty International stated that it had collected credible evidence that people detained in Turkey after July 15 coup attempt are beaten, tortured and on some occasions raped in official and unofficial detention centers across the country, on July 24.
However, a Justice and Development Party (AK Party) deputy has said there will be no investigations into claims of torture and mistreatment of people who have been put into prison since July 15 if those victims are sympathizers of Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, whom the government accuses of masterminding the attempt. (Turkey Purge)