Appeal

International Initiative
Freedom for Abdullah Ocalan - Peace in Kurdistan

By an act contravening all international law, an alliance of secret service forces handed over Abdullah Ocalan, the leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, to the very state that can give the least guarantee of a trial with any legal safeguards.

Ignoring the decision of Italian justice and the calls of international human rights organisations which opted against an extradition of Abdullah Öcalan to Turkey on his arrival in Rome, he was forcibly kidnapped and brought under the power of a state which heads the international statistics for torture and human rights violations.

The Kurdish leader was handed over to the military and politicians in Turkey who are responsible for the war in the Kurdish areas and its consequences: the destruction of 4,000 Kurdish villages, countless dead and more than three million displaced persons and refugees - consequences that could escalate into genocide.

No legal act can be more unjust than that in which the perpetrators are found to sit in judgement over the criminalised victim - mocking all the provisions of law.

No fair trial could be thought of in a Turkish court. This is more than sufficiently proven - not only by the total in-camera hearings, the 24-hour video surveillance, the humiliating broadcast of selected video clips and the extensive and unrelenting obstruction of any lawyer's work.

The European Human Rights Court in Strasbourg has already ruled that the State Security Courts of the Turkish Republic breach article 6 of the European Human Rights Convention: The required independence and impartiality of the judges is violated by the status of the military judges working in these courts. (Decision 09.06.98)

We fear that the decision against Abdullah Ocalan has been made a long time ago and that he will be a subjected to merely a show trial. Instead of the examination of evidence, a sentence will be passed, which will presumably be the death penalty which in turn is likely to be executed immediately.

The European governments have completely failed to take any constructive initiative to end the war in Turkey and resolve the Kurdish question. While they have done everything to provide conditions for a political and peaceful solution of the conflicts of the Palestinians at Madrid, the Bosnians at Dayton, and the Kosovo-Albanians at Rambouillet, we have been waiting in vain for a similar initiative for the Kurds for 15 years now.
The current tense situation still contains a chance: The Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan has to be seen as a key person in the political solution to the war in Kurdistan and this should be the context in which his wellbeing must be examined. The safety of Abdullah Ocalan, his freedom, is the acid test for Turkey to prove that it recognises and respects European democratic and legal values as a candidate for EU membership.

We call on the international community and its institutions:

•	to send an international monitoring team accompanied by an independent delegation of medical doctors;

•	to ensure a fair trial for Abdullah Ocalan in an international European court;

•	to ensure international human rights standards prevail during his stay in Turkey;

•	to immediately strive for an end to the war, to effectively deal with the causes of the conflict and call an international conference on Kurdistan;

Turkey must stop its military operations in the Kurdish areas immediately
and start a dialogue with the Kurdish side.

The first signatories:
Prof. Dr. Elmar Altvater, President, International Lelio Basso Donation for the rights of the peoples, Germany
Heidi Ambrosch, Vice-president and Women Speaker, Communist Party of Austria
Xabier Arzalluz, President, PNV (Basque Nationalist Party)
Lord Avebury, Chairman, Parliamentary Human Rights Group, House of Lords, Great Britain
Uri Avnery, Former Member of Knesset, Gush Shalom (Peace Bloc), Israel
Mag. Walter Baier, President, Communist Party of Austria
Jutta Bauer, Book Illustrator, Germany
Rolf Becker, Actor, IG Medien (Media Union), Germany
Tony Benn, Member of Parliament, Labour Party, Great Britain,
Christine Blower, Former President, National Union of Teachers (NUT), Great Britain
Hans Branscheidt, medico international / Appell von Hannover, Germany
Ken Cameron, General Secretary, Fire Brigades Union (FBU), Great Britain
Josep Lluis Carod Rouira, President ERC, Barcelona, Spain
Geraldine Chaplin, Actress, Madrid, Spain
Prof. Dr. Noam Chomsky, Linguist, Writer, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
Ramsey Clark, Lawyer, former Attorney General, USA
Harry Cohen, Member of Parliament, Labour Party, Great Britain
Cynog Dafis, Member of Parliament, Plaid Cymru, Great Britain
Prof. Dr. Helmut Dahmer, Sociology Professor, Darmstadt Technical University, Germany
Prof. Dr. Angela Davis, University of California, Santa Cruz, USA
Dr. Diether Dehm, Vice President, PDS, Germany
Adolfo Perez Esquivel, Nobel Literature Price Award, Argentine 
Michael Feeny, Adviser of Cardinal Hume in refugee affaires, Great Britain
Prof. Dr. Luigi Ferraioli, Philosophy and Law Professor, Italy
Paul Flynn, Member of Parliament, Labour Party, Great Britain
Dario Fo, Director, Writer, Actor, Nobel Literature Price Award, Italy
Domenico Gallo, Lawyer, former senator (CI), member of Magistratura Democratica, Italy
Prof. Dr. Uwe Jens Heuer, Law Professor, Berlin, Germany
Lord Raymond Hylton, House of Lords, Great Britain
Walid Jumblat, President, Socialist Progressive Party, Lebanon
Máiréad Keane, Director, International Department, Sinn Fein, Northern Ireland
Dietrich Kittner, Humorist, Writer, Cabarettist, Germany
David MacDowall, Writer, Great Britain
Máiréad Maguire, Nobel Price Award, Northern Ireland
Norbert Mattes, Information Project Near und Middle East, Germany
Danielle Mitterrand, President, Donation France Liberté, France
Prof. Dr. h.c. Ronald Mönch, Chair of Bremen Highschool, Germany
Yayla Mönch-Buçak, Oldenburg University, Germany
Gianna Nannini, Artist, Italy
Prof. Dr. Wolf-Dieter Narr, Comittee for Fundamental Rights and Democracy, Germany
Dr. Mamoud Osman, Kurdish Politician, Great Britain 
Prof. Dr. Norman Paech, International Law Professor, Hamburg School of Economy and Politics, Germany
Giovanni Palombarini, Lawyer, former president of Magistratura Democratica, Italy
Gareth Peirce, Lawyer, Great Britain
Livio Pepino, Lawyer, president of Magistratura Democratica, Italy
Franca Rame, Actress, Director, Writer, Italy
Jose Ramos-Horta, Peace Nobel Price Award, East-Timor
Lord Rea, House of Lords, Great Britain
Prof. Dr. Werner Ruf, International Law Professor, Kassel University, Germany
José Saramago, Nobel Literature Price Award, Portugal
Günther Schwarberg, Journalist, Germany
Prof. Dr. Gerhard Stuby, International Law Professor, Bremen University, Germany
Rudi Vis, Member of Parliament, Labour Party, Great Britain
Alice Walker, Writer, USA
Prof. Jürgen Waller, Chair of School of Arts, Bremen, Germany
Frances Webber, Barrister, Great Britain
Prof. Dr. Jean Ziegler, Member of the Swiss National Council, Publisher, Switzerland

I support with my signature the appeal of the International Initiative “Freedom for Abdullah Öcalan/ Peace in Kurdistan”

Name ......................................................................................................................................................

Institution, Organisation, Profession .....................................................................................................

Telephone / Fax .....................................................................................................................................

Signature ................................................................................................................................................
________________________________________________________________________________
International Initiative “Freedom for Abdullah Ocalan! – Peace in Kurdistan!” International Coordination Bureau,
Please return the signed appeal to the following address:
Internationale Initiative
P.O.Box 10 05 11
50445 Koeln
Fax: +49 221 13 93 071