Nine female executives and members of trade unions affiliated with the Confederation of Trade Unions of Public Employees (KESK) were arrested on Friday (17 February). They were part of a group of 14 women in total who were taken into custody one day before (16 February) in the scope of a Turkey-wide operation against the Union of Kurdish Communities (KCK). The KCK was founded by Abdullah Öcalan, imprisoned leader of the armed outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
The nine women are members of the Education and Science Workers' Union (Eğitim-Sen), the Health and Social Service Workers Union (SES) and the Municipal and Local Authority Trade Union (Tüm Bel-Sen), legal workers' organizations affiliated with KESK. They were arrested and imprisoned under allegations of "membership in an illegal organization".
The women arrested are KESK Women Secretary Canan Çalağan; Eğitim-Sen 1st Branch member Hatice Baydilli; SES Ankara Branch Women Secretary Nurşat Yeşil; former KESK executive Belkis Yurtsever; Tüm Bel-Sen Women Secretary Güler Elveren; SES Women Secretary Bedriye Yorgun; Eğitim-Sen 1st Branch member Evrim Oğraş, SES Ankara Branch Executive Hülya Mendilligil and Eğitim-Sen 2nd Branch Women Secretary Güldane Erdoğan.
"Operations aim at silencing KESK's opposition"
In a statement released after the custodies of their members, KESK had announced that the KCK operations against KESK were carried out by the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in order to break their opposition against the draft law on Public Service Unions (No. 4866).
KESK had furthermore argued that the arrest of women members in particular was aimed at the women's struggle initiated to make International Women's Day on 8 March a public holiday. (NV)
