Prisoner Buse Cuts Off Sex Organ After Being Prevented from Undergoing Sex Transition Surgery

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"We don't know how to explain this to you. However, we think it is also important in terms of information. On July 27, 2019, as a response to the Justice Ministry's arbitrary extortion of her right to be freed from prison in her body by disrupting the process of the surgery, Buse cut off her sex organ and carried out an act. She was taken to the hospital. Her condition is better at the moment and her transfer to the Metris Prison has taken place. We expect her to be transferred to Haseki State Hospital in the coming days."

this is how her friend Derya Özata describes the recent situation in the struggle initiated by trans prisoner Buse Aydin, who is being held as a prisoner in Metris Prison, to change her gender identity.

Friends of Buse who are members of LGBTI+ organizations and rights advocates, and her lawyer Eren Keskin, issued a press release today at the İstanbul branch of the Human Rights Association (İHD).

Speaking first in the statement, Keskin said that Buse could not undergo surgery because the Ministry of Health did not provide the budget required to perform the operation. Saying that Buse's surgery has not been performed despite a medical report that states she can undergo an operation, Keskin noted they applied to the Ankara Administrative Court for the cancellation of the requirement by the Ministry of Health that Buse should pay for the surgery.

Statement by the friends of Buse

Derya Özata, who later read the statement on behalf of Buse's friends, said:

"We, Buse's friends, know that this period which Buse is subjected to discrimination and has been striving for six years is not the first example of the violence that trans women are subjected to. But it is necessary to see that this process, extended for months by the Ministry of Justice, is the result of a holistic policy of violence against trans women held in isolation on the grounds of security. The conditions of transphobia and isolation in prisons threaten and harm the psychological and physical integrity of trans people.

"Last year, Diren Coşkun and this year, Esra Arikan were forced to take various actions to make their voices heard because of the discrimination, violence and torture they suffered in their prisons. Buse was also discriminated against repeatedly, forced to do a hunger strike and death fast, in the six years she spent in prison and worked for the body adjustment process. Unfortunately, it is not difficult to estimate that many trans people, whom we do not know names and conditions of, are also subjected to various forms of discrimination.

"Buse has been in prison for 24 years. We want Buse to live. We see that both her body and her psychology do not have the strength to withstand this torture that she has resisted for years. The extent of this systematic torture became so much for Buse that she cut off her genitals.

"Buse needs to be freed from the prison in her body to survive, andsheneeds solidarity and strength to survive. We call on all LGBTI+ and LGBTI+ phobia opponents to support the solidarity network we will establish."

"Buse's process is not the first; our struggle will continue so that more trans women in prisons are not subjected to discrimination and mistreatment. We ask you to disseminate this call in order for the public to be aware of Buse and other trans prisoners.

You can follow the process on Twitter via the @buseyasasin account and the hashtag #Buseyasasın (Buse should live).

What happened?

Trans prisoner Buse had gone on a 38-day hunger strike in July 2018 to have her gender transition surgery accepted.

He suspended the death fast over the court's ruling thatshe"could have surgery." However, her surgery did not take place. Buse had begun her death fast again on January 31, 2019.

Human Rights Association İstanbul delivered the letter describing her condition to the United Nations on 20 February 2019.

The letter said the Justice Department's blocking of the surgery is against 8th and 14th articles of the European Convention on Human Rights.

(EMK/VK)