[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 14205-14206]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       KURDISH PRISONERS RELEASED

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from California (Mr. Filner) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. FILNER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to spend a few minutes to talk 
about some developments recently in the country of Turkey, some of 
which we celebrate, some of which we have great concern about.
  Let me first, by the way, extend my condolences to victims of 
yesterday's terrorist bombings in Turkey and to the families of the 
victims. Certainly we want the perpetrators brought to justice quickly.
  But I rise to celebrate a small, but very important, victory for 
human rights that took place last week. Four human rights prisoners in 
Turkey were released. Leyla Zana, a prominent Kurdish advocate for 
human rights, and her colleagues, Hatip Dicle, Slim Sadak and Ornhan 
Dogan, were released from prison following a June 9 appeals court 
ruling in their favor.
  These were Kurdish citizens of Turkey. These were citizens who were 
elected by majority vote to the Turkish Parliament. These were Kurds 
who had the nerve to speak their own native language, Kurdish, in the 
Turkish Parliament; and they were arrested and sentenced to 15 years in 
prison.
  Amnesty International declared them prisoners of conscience. They 
have been there 10 years.
  Leyla Zana was probably the best known of the four prisoners. She was 
the first Kurdish woman elected to Turkey's Parliament who openly and 
proudly identified herself as a Kurd. In fact, the European Parliament 
awarded her a Sakharov Prize in 1995 for defending human rights.
  I had the great pleasure of getting to know her husband, Mayda, who 
traveled around the world to talk about the injustice of his wife being 
in prison. I spent time with her son Ronee who was for a short time a 
student in Los Angeles. This was a whole family dedicated to human 
rights for all, and especially to the Kurdish minority who has been 
denied them in Turkey.
  The release of these prisoners of conscience was a result of 
international pressure, and I want to thank the 21 Members of Congress 
who joined with me in H. Res. 302 that called for the release of these 
four parliamentarians. The Kurdish community in the United States, as 
well as human rights advocates across the country, played an important 
role in gaining their release.
  So we welcome the release of these prisoners of conscience, as well 
as other reforms in Turkey, including the introduction of public 
broadcasting in minority languages. However, serious human rights and 
repression of the Kurds continue in Turkey.
  From June 8-10, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the 
International Federation for Human Rights joined with Turkish human 
rights groups in a joint delegation to investigate the situation in 
Turkey. They heard continuing allegations of torture and violations of 
freedom of expression, assembly, association, religion, and the right 
to a fair trial. They

[[Page 14206]]

expressed concern about prisons, national minorities, the lack of 
independent investigations into human rights violations, and internal 
displacement.
  The State Department human rights report, released just in February, 
also found that serious human rights problems exist. The report says 
that security forces killed 43 people last year and participated in 
widespread torture, beatings, and other abuses. The Turkish Government 
continued to limit free speech in the press and, in particular, 
restricted expression by people sympathetic to Kurdish cultural or 
nationalist viewpoints.
  So we are pleased at the release of Leyla Zana and her colleagues, 
but we are not placated by this good news. We demand greater progress. 
The European Union should insist that Turkey take greater strides to 
improve its human rights record and treatment of the Kurds before 
joining the European Union. Turkey needs to realize that its Kurdish 
citizens enrich the country rather than threaten it.
  President Bush will visit Turkey for a NATO summit next week. He 
should use this opportunity to press for greater respect for human 
rights. I would hope that he meets with Leyla Zana and shows his 
respect for human rights for the Kurdish minority in Turkey.

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