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Two separate reports by rights defenders and lawyers say that Covid-19 is spreading in prisons across the country and call the authorities to take measures, including providing hygiene and testing prisoners for coronavirus.
"The Covid-19 weekly prison monitoring bulletin" prepared by the Contemporary Lawyers' Association (ÇHD), the Human Rights Association, the Lawyers for Freedom (ÖHD) and the MED TUHAD-FED says that medical controls of prisoners both for Covid-19 and other diseases are not done in time, there are problems regarding nutrition and patients are not provided with a diet meal.
Some of the report's findings are:
The report also lists the following demands:
The ÖHD and TUHAY-DER say in the "Covid-19 Outbreak Report in Marmara Region Prisons" that the outbreak has caused panic among prisoners, the hygiene rules are not followed in prisons and prisoners are not provided with disinfectant.
*The postponement of prison visits does not protect the prisoners from the outbreak but means that they are in confinement.
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*Although correction officers who work inside the prisons are quarantined and officers' contact with the outside is restricted, the measures are not sufficient to protect the prisoners' right to life and healthcare. In the statement made by the Ministry, it was stated that the coronavirus test of 79 enforcement officers was positive. It is also known that some doctors who go to prison infirmaries have tested positive for coronavirus.
*Dozens of prisoners contracted coronavirus at Tarsus Type-T Prison, Buca Closed Prison, Konya Type-E Prison, and Silivri No. 7 Type-L Prison. The outbreak is rapidly spreading in prisons. There are increasing concerns that prisoners kept in prisons while the virus is spreading will cause irreversible damages in terms of violation of the right to life and health.
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*Failure to provide healthy nutritional conditions, insufficient cleaning and hygiene materials, water shortage in some prisons, the suspension of treatments of ill prisoners, suspension of visits, restriction of attorney visits and not delivering/sending cargo and letters in some prisons increase the concerns of prisoners' families and the public.
*The state has negative and positive obligations regarding the right to life without any discrimination against its citizens. Currently, the positive obligations regarding the right to life of prisoners must be fulfilled and necessary measures must be taken for the life and health rights of prisoners.
*Excluding political prisoners in the amendments violated the principle of equality and the prohibition of discrimination. This practice should end as soon as possible and those remanded in custody should be released.
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*Prisoners with chronic diseases, regardless of being arrested or convicted, should be urgently released, regardless of the severity of their illness, as they are more prone to the disease due to the weakness of their immune system.
*Sentences of convicts in risk groups should be enforced at home. At this point, the legal regulations should be made urgently. In the context of the Covid-19 pandemic, the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) recommended that alternative practices to imprisonment should be applied and that the most vulnerable prisoners should be able to access intensive care by conducting Covid-19 screening. (AS/EMK/VK)