Unzile Aksakoglu struggles to explain to her seven-year-old daughter why her fat...
ISTANBUL - Unzile Aksakoglu struggles to explain to her seven-year-old daughter why her father Yigit has spent four months in jail and may never leave, because of his alleged role in mass protests against Turkey’s government when she was just a year old.
But in November, Yigit Aksakoglu was detained and is now facing trial with 15 other civil society figures, writers and actors. For a while Aksakoglu’s family hoped he would soon be released, but then on March 4, a 657-page indictment was released saying they had masterminded an attempt to overthrow Erdogan’s government.
The arrests are the latest step in a crackdown which Turkey says is a necessary response to security threats that the country faces and which has involved widespread purges in the armed forces, ministries and state organisations.In the summer of 2013, hundreds of thousands marched in Istanbul and across Turkey to protest against plans to build replica Ottoman barracks on Gezi Park by Istanbul’s Taksim Square, chanting “everywhere is Taksim, everywhere is resistance”.
It said the fact that defendants discussed bringing milk, juice and pastries to Gezi, as well as gasmasks to counter the effects of tear gas, showed they were financing the protests. Amnesty International Turkey representative Andrew Gardner described the case as “an attempt to rewrite history” and said the request for life sentences without parole represented a “massive escalation” in Turkey’s crackdown on civil society.
“No one in Turkey gets away with crimes they committed any more,” the president said in a speech last week.Aksakoglu, who works for a Dutch foundation which supports young children’s development, was interrogated for 11 hours after he was detained in November. The specific charges against him say he was involved in organising meetings to prepare civil disobedience.
“You hold these people responsible for all the windows that were broken in June 2013... but provide no evidence. This is not something that can be done legally,” he said.
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