2000 - Special Washington & New-York

The trial was scheduled for October 29. The indictment charged that the press confernce was an illegal political act of civil disobedience because a permit had not been requested. Still, Nevin Kaplan said she was not worried about the outcome. "We have taken much bigger risks in the past," she remarked.

On October 6, a bus carried marchers to Ankara where they were having their national rally. The route was a political statement in itself, Nevin Kaplan told us. The bus made solidarity stops in a number of places, particularly where women had lived through earthquakes and the violence that accompanies this kind of natural disaster: serial harassment and sexual abuse.

The bus was stopped in Düzce. At first the women were not allowed off. Finally the dorrs was opened and the bus emptied out. The moment the demonstrators left the bus, the police charged them. To slow down the arrests, the women sat down. They simply wanted to have their meeting with the women refugees of Düzce. Five women were imprisoned, one with a serious leg injury.

When they were arrested, the women called for help from their organization in Ankara. Letters protesting their arrest were faxed immediately to the police and the foreign affairs minister. Nevin Kaplan spoke of large-scale mobilization in support of the women, who were finally released and able to reach Ankara.

The national rally was a great success; over 3000 women were there for the national action on October 8.

Nevin Kaplan explained Turkish women's commitment to the March

Turkish women's priorities in their struggle

The World March of Women was prepared to show solidarity with women around the world but also among women in Turkey. All women have problems in common, but Turkish women have specific problems of violence to fight against.

For the forces of law and order, rape is a common practice to discourage political opposition. Women who are victims of domestic violence are not protected by the law nor by the police.

Just over three months ago, women won one fight: a law prohibiting domestic violence and giving women the right to file a complaint with the police or even against the police. It is just a start, a small victory won through resisting and fighting against clearly institutionalized oppression, but now women have to see that the law is enforced. In Turkey, women are asking for shelters for battered women to be set up. Right now there is only one; it is in Istanbul.

The United Nations should make it an obligation for member States to undertake national protection of women who are victims of domestic violence and want to leave home. The UN should have the power to force member States to sign and implement international instruments that defend women's rights.

In Turkey, women launched a signature campaign directed at the prime minister and the president to have them implement CEDAW and withdraw the reservations Turkey made when it ratified the instrument.

The forms of violence perpetrated against women in Turkey are still largely justified by tradition. In the countryside, traditional and forced marriages are commonly accepted customs. Any sexual relationship with a man who is not accepted by the family is considered a blow to the honour of the family, who then take reprisals against the woman, who may even pay the price of an honour crime.

The curtailment of women's freedom is legitimized by evoking traditional practices. Women do not want to submit to those traditions any more, however. Imposed virginity, responsibility for women taken by other family members are no longer seen in the same light as before. Women would like to be able to go against the family's wishes and hear people say, finally, that it is unfair to have to depend wholly on their wishes. The demand for democracy is closely related to the demand for the recognition of women's right to be independent.

In Turkey traditions are never questioned, and women's struggle is basically to reverse that way of thinking.

An opportunity to show solidarity

We ask the IMF and the World Bank to end the economic policies imposed on Turkey. Women bear the economic burden of those policies. We are demanding economic equality and more particularly pay equity, also in the public sector. But economic equality will not be achieved until the practice of automatically giving to men the status of head of household is abolished.