This afternoon I was at the Istanbul office of the governing AK Party. I expected to see groups of people around televisions, watching the voting in parliament today on ‘the headscarf issue’. Today was the first round of voting on a proposal to change the constitution so that women with a scarf can no longer be denied access to university. …
“We stay on the street, with our purple needle!” On first encounter, it’s a somewhat weird slogan that is resounding through Istanbul’s biggest shopping street, Istiklal Caddesi, every Friday night. The purple needle (‘mor iğne’ in Turkish), explains Tuğba Tekerek of the action group Mor Iğne, has for years been a symbol used by the Turkish women’s movement against sexual …
pro-Kurdish party DTP: in the shadow of the PKK
The Turkish pro-Kurdish Party for a Democratic Society (DTP) loses voters to the governing AK Party. No reason for DTP-leader Ahmet Türk to soften his opinions: “Amnesty for PKK fighters must be discussed and the murderers of Kurdish politicians, journalists and human rights activists must be brought to justice.”
(published in Wordt Vervolgd, monthly magazine of Dutch Amnesty International)
The end is …
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