BOĞAZİÇİ PROTESTS
UN human rights office calls for release of students, condemns anti-LGBTI+ discrimination
Photo: Dilek Şen/bianet
Click to read the article in Turkish / Kurdish
The office of the UN Human Rights High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet has called for the release of students who have been detained during the protests at Boğaziçi University.
In a Twitter post, the office said, "We call for prompt release of students and protestors arrested for participating in peaceful demonstrations, and urge the police to stop using excessive force."
Students and academics of Boğaziçi University, one of the country's top higher education institutions, have protested the appointment of a rector from outside the university's academic community for a month now.
The protests have intensified over the past few days as more than 250 people were detained in Boğaziçi University and other demonstrations held in support for the university in İstanbul, Ankara and İzmir, the three largest cities of the country. Dozens of students are still in custody.
"We condemn homophobic & transphobic comments by officials, inciting hatred and discrimination against LGBT people," the UN office also said, referring to anti-LGBTI+ remarks by senior government officials, including President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Minister of Interior Süleyman Soylu.
Government officials and pro-government media have specifically targeted LGBTI+s during the protests, especially after the display of an artwork depicting Kaaba, the most sacred place in Islam, together with a rainbow flag during an event at the university.
CLICK - Boğaziçi protests: LGBTI+ groups denounce hate speech by government officials
Although students explained in a video that they displayed all the works sent to them, anti LGBTI+ statements continued.
Rector Melih Bulu closed the LGBTI+ Studies Club, the group that organized the event in question, citing a criminal investigation into the event for several offenses, including "inciting the public into animosity and hatred."
Twitter on Tuesday (February 2) restricted access to one of Soylu's tweets in which he called LGBTI+s "deviant."
Since the start of the protests, Erdoğan has also said multiple times that he wouldn't like the country's youth to be LGBTI+s but be loyal to "the national and spiritual values."
Fahrettin Altun, Erdoğan's communications director, called LGBTI+s "a wild minority" and they wouldn't allow "immorality to be promoted as freedom" in a series of tweets on January 30.
#Turkey: We call for prompt release of students & protestors arrested for participating in peaceful demonstrations, and urge the police to stop using excessive force. We condemn homophobic & transphobic comments by officials, inciting hatred & discrimination against LGBT people. pic.twitter.com/EXF9RvMiyQ
— UN Human Rights (@UNHumanRights) February 3, 2021
What happened?Prof. Melih Bulu has been appointed as the President of Boğaziçi University in a Presidential Decree issued on January 1. The appointment of Bulu has sparked harsh criticisms among both the students and academics of the university as well as in the academic community. Appointed to Boğaziçi, one of the most prestigious universities in Turkey, from outside its community, Bulu was a candidate for nomination to run in the Parliamentary elections in 2015 for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), which is chaired by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. The students and several students' clubs of the university have been campaigning on social media under the hashtag #kayyımrektöristemiyoruz (We don't want a trustee university president). The call of the students was also supported by the faculty members of the university, who released a joint statement on January 3. "An academic outside Bogazici University community was appointed as rector (university president), which is a practice introduced for the first time after the 1980s military tutelage," read their statement. Amid harsh criticisms of students and faculty members, Prof. Bulu has shared a message on his Twitter account, welcoming his appointment to the position, saying, "We are all in the same boat." The students protested the appointment of Bulu in front of the South Campus of the university in İstanbul on January 4. However, the police intervened into the protest with pepper gas and plastic bullets. Next day, it was reported that there were detention warrants against 28 people for "violating the law on meetings and demonstrations" and "resisting the officer on duty." Later in the day, 22 of them were detained. 40 people in total were detained over the protests. All of the detained were released on January 7 and 8, 2021. The protests of students and faculty members at the South Campus of Boğaziçi University have been going on since January 4. On February 1, police stormed the South Campus and intervened into the students' protests. Earlier in the day, the students gathered in front of the campus for the protest. Police hindered the protest while also preventing the students inside the South Campus from joining their friends outside. With the 51 students taken into custody inside the campus in the evening, the number of detained increased to 159. In a statement released by the İstanbul Governor's Office in the early morning hours on February 2, it was announced that 98 students were released from detention. On February 2, Boğaziçi University students gathered in Kadıköy Rıhtım for another protest, which was attacked by the police with plastic bullets and tear gas. 104 people were taken into custody by the police. About Melih BuluProf. Melih Bulu was appointed as the President of Haliç University on January 17, 2020. In office in this foundation university for less than a year, he has been appointed as the President of Boğaziçi University. He was a Dean and University President at the İstinye University from 2016 to 2019. Between the years of 2010 and 2016, he was the Head of the Business Management Department of İstanbul Şehir University's Business Management and Management Science Faculty. He was the General Coordinator of International Competitiveness Research Institute (URAK), an NGO working on economic competitiveness of cities and countries, from the year 2017 to 2019. Since 2011, he has been the Executive Board member of the İstanbul Electric-Electronic Machinery and Informatics Exporters R&D Market. In 2002, he founded the Sarıyer District Organization of the ruling AKP in İstanbul. In 2015, he was a candidate for nomination to run in the Parliamentary elections from the AKP in the first election district in İstanbul. He studied Industrial Engineering at the Middle East Technical University (METU) in Ankara in 1992. He did his MBA and PhD at Boğaziçi University's Department of Management. |
(EKN/VK)