Women gather in İstanbul's Kadıköy to mark day against violence

Photos and video: Evrim Kepenek/bianet

Click to read the article in Turkish / Kurdish

Women gathered in İstanbul's Kadıköy district to mark the Day for Elimination of Violence Against Women.

Demonstrators headed from various parts of the district to Kadıköy Square while chanting slogans, "Women, life, freedom" (Jin, jiyan, azadi in Kurdish) and "The world would be shaken if women were free" and holding photographs of women who were killed in feminicides.

The police initially set up barricades near the piers but eventually allowed the women to gather on the square.

Women chanting slogans, calling on the police to remove barricades:

Here, a statement by the November 25 Women's Platform was read out in Turkish and Kurdish.

"Against the attacks on our life and our autonomy on our bodies through the policies of reproduction, we stand up all over the world," said the statement.

"The violence and attacks of the male state increased exponentially with the pandemic. They tried to lock women to homes, where they face the risk of violence and murder, without any state protection, without any emergency action plans and measures.

"With the practice of working from home and schools not opening, they expected us to be machines that are ready for work 24/7 and that undertake paid work, housework and child care.

"They tried to weaken our relationship with the public sphere and push us into poverty by opening our living spaces for destruction by mega projects.

"They tried to usurp what we have gained after decades of struggle by closing women's organizations and centers with trustees and targeting co-chairpersonship.

"They tried to condemn us to male-state violence by reinforcing male violence through permanent war policies and guaranteeing that uniformed perpetrators won't stand trial.

"We haven't given up on solidarity and joint struggle against the government's efforts to make women lonely, let alone protect them. While they continued to protect the perpetrators, release them with the criminal enforcement law and leave them unpunished, we continued to hold them to account for our sisters. What happened to Rabia Naz, Nadira Kadirova, Gülistan Doku, suspicious murders of women? Why was the rapist sergeant Musa Orhan, who caused İpek Er's death, was arrested first and then released?

"We have not stopped asking these questions not only for the perpetrators to stand trial but also for the state to take responsibility!

"We draw strength from women who protect their lives against the male-state and its violence, which are trying to circumscribe our lives, our rights, our bodies and our labor.

"We bring the voice of Nevin Yıldırım, Hülya Halaçkay to the squares. We have not given up and are not giving up our demand not of male justice but of real justice, our struggle against misogynist state policies and our insistence of revealing the cooperation of men-judiciary-state!" (EMK/VK)