Turkey – Bayram Yıldız, a 19-year-old victim of the Pozantı Prison scandal, has been rearrested and was battered by police during questioning, his sister and a witness said.
Makbule Yıldız said her brother was detained yet again by plainclothes police officers on Sunday, and was hit on the head during interrogation. An eyewitness said Bayram’s head was bleeding when he was taken to hospital for a health check.
His family sought legal help from the Mersin branch of the Human Rights Association (IHD).
“Almost all of the victimized child prisoners of Pozantı have been arrested again after their release as an act of revenge,” Ali Tanrıverdi, head of the Mersin branch of IHD, told Rudaw.
Yıldız was detained twice since the Pozantı scandal, which caused a huge public outcry when it was exposed in April 2011. The scandal came to light after seven children aged between 13 and 17 sent handwritten notes to IHD, reporting sexual and physical abuses, rape and ill-treatment.
A report presented at the European Parliament revealed rights violations at the Pozanti Prison, where child prisoners were exposed to rape and harassment, including being forced to kiss the Turkish flag, denying their Kurdish identity and refused permission to speak Kurdish in prison.
Teenagers recounted that they or their friends were raped multiple times or were otherwise humiliated by ordinary prisoners.
The report also emphasized that the children were beaten with sticks and iron bars by police, soldiers and guardians, or were kept waiting naked in the cold for being Kurdish.
After the scandal emerged, the children were transferred to the Sincan Children’s and Juvenile Prison in Ankara, where they were allegedly beaten and frisked naked. Hurmuz Bicer, a lawyer with IHD in Ankara reported rights violations at Sincan, based on conversations with jailed children.
In May 2013, another scandal broke out at the Sakran Prison in Izmir, where the Contemporary Lawyers' Association reported that child prisoners were beaten with hoses and put through systematic torture. An unnamed child prisoner had attempted to commit suicide, said Serdar Gultekin, a lawyer working with the association.
