Complaint Against Founding Membership of Abdulmelik Firat
The chief public prosecutor from the Turkish Court of Appeal in Ankara has made a complaint to the Constitu-tional Court against Abdulmelik Firat, leader of the pro-Kurdish party HAK-PAR. He has called for Firat’s membership and that of 12 other members, to be annulled because these members, like AKP leader Tayyip Erdovan, have served prison sentences in the past for their ideas.
Following earlier legal proceedings to ban HAK-PAR, which was formed at the beginning of the year, it is clear that the chief public prosecutor’s actions are intended to obstruct HAK-PAR’s activities. (Source: IMK and Radikal, 29.06.02)

Up to 3 Years Imprisonment for Addressing Öcalan as “Mr.” 
A court in Turkey has brought a case against an economist for distributing propaganda because he had referred to the Kurdish rebel leader Öcalan as “Mr.” at a conference. He is liable to up to 3 years imprisonment. (ap, taz , 26.06.02)

Inquiry into “Refugee Report” 
The public prosecutor of Istanbul’s DGM has initiated an inquiry into the leadership of "Göc-Der", the support and culture association for refugees. Grounds for the inquiry is the organization’s “Refugee Report” which was completed following 3 years of investigations. The inquiry will be carried out into the head of the organization, S. Güzbüz, and the sociologist, M. Barut, who was influential in pro-ducing the report. Comments such as “Turkish citizenship, Kurdish origin”, “Kurdish”, “Zazaca” and “as a conse-quence of villages destroyed by OHAL activity” appear to be the justification for such the inquiry. The inquiry was condemned by the association at a press conference. Its head said that pressure had increased on all its branches but especially on its headquarters. "Despite the lifting of the state of emergency in Van, state of emergency regulations are still being used to justify repressive activities. How can state of emergency regulations be used in a region where there is no state of emergency?”, demanded Güzbüz on the banning of an open air event on 5.6.2002. She said it indicated that the legislative changes had taken place only on paper and had not been put into practice.
The event, which had been permitted earlier in the year as part of the “Refugee Week”, was banned in Istanbul (for, amongst other reasons, “disrupting national security” and “upholding national unity”...) (Source: Özgür Politika, 25.06.02)

Journalist Found Guilty 
On 24.06.2002, Mersin’s Criminal Court sentenced the journalist Güler Yildiz, former chief editor of the regional newspaper “Cinar”, to 10 months imprisonment as well as a fine of 600 million Turkish Lira. This was the second time that the penalty had been imposed under § 159 of the Turkish Penal Code. It concerned book reviews of “The Soldier’s Book” (Mehmetin Kitabi) by Nadire Mater. The court had revoked an earlier judgment following an amendment to the law. Nadire Mater and the publisher Semih Sökmen had been found not guilty on 02.10.2000. (Source: Yedinci Gündem, 25.06.02)

Torture in Mersin 
Bekir Geyik, head of the IHD in Tarsus, has reported on a case of torture towards Atilla Güray. He had been arrested at a picnic on 22.06.2002 for opening of an office for the publication “Isçi Köylü”. He was allegedly tied to a radiator and then beaten and verbally abused until being released on 24.06.2002. (Source: TIHV, 26.06.02)

No Action to be Taken in Torture Case
Çankaya’s (Ankara) regional administration has not agreed to an inquiry into alleged torture towards Saadet Erdem, head of the IHD in Ankara. Saadet Erdem claims that he was beaten during the Newroz celebrations. The admini-stration justified its refusal for an inquiry because of lack of evidence. (Source: TIHV, 26.06.02)

Guilty Verdict Against Cevat Soysal 
On 25.06.2002 the 1st chamber of Ankara’s state security court convicted Cevat Soysal, who had been apprehended in Moldavia and taken back to Turkey, to 18 years and 9 months imprisonment for being a leading member of the PKK. The death penalty had initially been called for. Fel-low defendant Ali Kandemir (SES) was found not guilty and the case against Osman Özçelik (HADEP) was dis-missed. (Source: Evrensel, 26.06.02)

Torture Case Inadmissible 
The 1st Chamber of the Criminal Court in Diyarbakir has dismissed the case against 2 police officers who had been accused of torturing HADEP member Hasan Irmak (52) in May 2000. In the view of the public prosecutor, the offi-cers Kamber Özperçin and Mustafa Yücel had sprayed their suspect with high pressure water, crushed his testicles, beaten his left ear, and subjected him to psychological pressure in order that he made a confession. They had therefore been charged under §243 of the Turkish Penal Code. The court has now judged that the necessary permission for such a case had not been applied for to the governor of the state of emergency and that the case could therefore not proceed. 
Last year the lawyer Sedat Yurttas made a compensation claim against the Ministry of the Interior because his client Hasan Irmak had been impotent since being tortured on the 11th and 12th May 2000 and that there was blood in his urine. He was also no longer able to work as a hairdresser because of his shaky hands. (Source: Cumhuriyet, 28.06.02)

Fikret Baskaya Released
On 27.06.2002 Dr. Fikret Baskaya was released from prison in Kalecik. He had been serving a 16 month sen-tence for an article in the daily newspaper “Özgür Bakis”, no longer being published, from 01.06.1999 entitled “An Historical Case?”. The penalty imposed by Istanbul’s state security court was upheld by the court of appeal on 26.01.2002. Dr. Baskaya has been in prison since 29th June 2001.  (Source: TIHV, 28.06.02)

Torture Towards Adolescent 
The lawyer Merve Sen revealed the following concerning an incident in Istanbul: “The Lawyers’ Association ap-pointed me as counsel to I.T. (16) who was being held in the police station at Caglayan under a suspicion of theft. I noticed bruising and he told me he had been beaten, had not received anything to eat or drink and had been threatened of being raped with a police truncheon. In a statement, which asserted his right to remain silent, I wrote that he had been beaten and had not received anything to eat or drink. Seven or eight police officers then burst in on me and ripped the statement from my hand to destroy it. I took IT to the Eftal hospital in Sisli where we received a medical attestation”. The lawyer said charges would be brought for the torture and for the way in which she had been treated. (Source: Evrensel, 03.07.02)

Torture Towards Adolescent 
A second case against the leadership of Diyarbakir’s IHD has begun before the 1st chamber of Diyarbakir’s Criminal Court. This case concerns invitations to a reception on 20.3.2002 for the Newroz celebrations. The first case before the 3rd chamber of Diyarbakir’s Criminal Court concerns a decision by the leadership from 14.03.2002 to send out the invitations. The court believe that there has been a breach of the associations law because the word Newroz was used instead of the Turkish word Nevruz and the law requires that the Turkish language is used for internal and external communication and publications (Article 36). In both cases the leader Osman Baydemir and leading members Fikret Saraçoglu, Selahattin Demirtas, Abdulkadir Aydin, Reyhan Yalçindag, Meral Danis Bestas and Piruzhan Dogrul have been charged. Along with a prison term of up to 2 years, the branch also fear being officially banned. (Source: Yedinci Gündem, 04.07.02)

Special Report on Death Penalty 
On the instigation of the Justice Ministry, a commission under the leadership of Prof. Dr. Sulhi Dönmeer has issued a 44 page study on the death penalty which calls for its abolition. The study reports on 129 executions since 1960. Between 1994 and 1997 there have been 1394 death sentences for murder and 904 under § 125 of the Turkish Penal Code (violent attempt to partition the country). Ac-cording to the report the death penalty has been completely abolished in 57 countries and in 15 countries for non-political offences. A further 26 countries have abolished it de facto (including Turkey). The death penalty still exists in 95 countries. (Source: Radikal, 04.07.02)

“Flag Case” Against HADEP Dismissed 
On 04.07.2002, the 1st Chamber of Ankara’s State Security Courts reached its second judgment in the so-called “Flag Case” against HADEP who removed the Turkish flag on commencement of its 2nd Ordinary Congress in 1996. 
The court agreed with the prosecution and defense argu-ment that the activities of the remaining 39 defendants came under § 169 of the Turkish Penal Code (supporting an armed organization) and should be dismissed under Law 4616 regarding conditional release and the dismissal of cases. The case had to be reopened after the Court of Appeal lifted the first judgment from 18.06.1998 because defendants in similar situations received differing penal-ties. The not guilty verdicts had then been confirmed for Sirri Sakik and Abdurrahim Bilen, as well as the prison term of 22.5 years for Faysal Akcan who had removed the flag. (Source: Cumhuriyet, 05.07.02) 

Death Because of Photograph 
At the end of June 71 year old Medine Bircan died because hospitals in Istanbul refused to admit her. Grounds for the refusal was the photograph in her health card which showed her wearing a headscarf. Numerous writers and lawyers in Istanbul have issued joint complaints against the hospitals. (Source: Mazlum-Der, 08.07.02)

Case Against Eren Keskin – 
In Trouble because of Talks With Minister 
Because of talks with the German Minister Herta Däubler-Gmelin (SPD), the head of the Turkish Human Rights Association (IHD) now has to answer to a Turkish criminal court. Keskin has been charged with “libeling the Turkish Armed Forces”. Däubler-Gmelin had met 10 representatives of Turkish NGOs in June 2001 in the German General Consulate in Istanbul. Keskin was amongst them. 
Reports on the meeting later appeared in the weekly publi-cation “Aydinlik”. The report’s author and the chief editor are also charged with the same offence. Keskin is accused of “libeling and offending” the armed forces by claiming that Turkish politics was not determined by political par-ties but rather by the general staffs of the military. She portrayed the army as “an opponent to democracy” and as an institution which pressurized the political leadership. This was revealed in statement issued by the public prose-cutor‘s press office. 
Keskin therefore had to appear before Istanbul’s 2nd Criminal Court for Serious Crimes. In a letter to Turkish Justice Minister Hikmet Sami Türk the German govern-ment’s Human Rights Committee heavily protested against the case. The human rights situation in Turkey was also recently on the committee’s agenda. Committee chairper-son Christa Nickels (Grüne) had told the German daily Süddeutschen Zeitung (SZ) that Keskin’s case would play a significant role in this.
Nickels had already expressed his concern to the Trukish ambassador in Berlin, Osman Korotürk, on the increasing number of criminal cases against human rights lawyers. He told SZ that “The abundance of cases is beginning to look like harassment”. The charge sheet also implies that the talks with the German minister in the consulate building concerned a “secret” meeting. 
Meetings with non-governmental representatives are regu-larly organized by the consulate and embassy for German members of parliament. The meeting with Däubler-Gmelin took place shortly after the banning of the Islamic Fazilet-Party through the Turkish constitution. Nickels pointed to Turkey’s desire to become a member of the European Union. He said that Ankara had made constitutional amendments to provide more freedom of opinion. How-ever, what was important was “the implementation of such amendments in practice” The case against Keskin was “very negative” on this count. In April, the Human Rights Committee had expressed its criticism to the Turkish Judi-cial Secretary Seref Ünal in Berlin. Participants claim that the meeting was “very lively“. (Quelle: SZ, 02.07.02) 

Verheugen: No Date for Turkey’s EU Mem-bership 
The EU Commission is not prepared to give Turkey a date for the commencement of entry negotiations until all entry conditions have been met. EU Enlargement Commissioner Günter Verheugen told the German daily Frankfurter Allgemeinen Zeitung that "The commission was against any political horse-trading”. He therefore excluded the possibility that a Turkish compromise on the Cyprus issue at the EU summit in Copenhagen at the end of the year would be rewarded with a concrete agreement on entry talks. Despite some progress Verheugen still saw “considerable” deficits in Ankara particularly in respect of political conditions. (Source: dpa, 30.06.02)

European Council Severely Criticizes Turkey 
The European Council has expressed unusually harsh criticism towards Turkey. In a recent resolution the Com-mittee of Ministers observed that there continued to be many complaints of torture and abuse by security forces, particularly in the country’s south east which is affected by the Kurdish conflict. The reforms to police training agreed on 3 years ago have still not brought any “concrete or noticeable progress”. Since 1996 Turkey has been con-victed 42 times by the European Court of Human Rights for torture, abuse, killings and the destruction of Kurdish villages. Many cases are still pending. Most cases concern the southeast where a state of emergency exists because of the bloody conflict between Kurdish rebels and security forces. (Source: AFP, 10.07.02)

Iran Forbids Student-Demonstration
The Iranian Ministry of the Interior has banned a student demonstration on the 3rd anniversary of the 1999 distur-bances. According to recent newspaper reports in Teheran the ministry had initially authorized the demonstration. A student spokesperson said that the ministry supposedly could no longer guarantee security at the demonstration.
On 9.07.1999 police and radical Islamists had stormed a student house to suppress a protest for greater press free-dom. This police action, which resulted in 1 death, then led to student disturbances. Amongst other things, students now wanted to demonstrate for the release of political prisoners as well as the right to criticize those in power. (Source: dpa, 08.07.02)

200 Arrests Following Disturbances in Iran –
Reports on Criticism Banned
Following heavy clashes between demonstrators and po-lice and Islamic fundamentalists, more than 200 people have been arrested in Iran. According to the state newspa-per "Iran", police said that those arrested had demolished shops and parked vehicles. The clashes arose from banned protest actions on the 3rd anniversary of the 1999 student disturbances. 
Meanwhile, the Supreme National Security Council have forbidden Iranian newspapers from reporting criticism by a high ranking cleric. This was recently revealed  by the reform oriented newspaper "Noruz".
Ayatollah Jalaleddin Taheri recently resigned after 30 years as leader of Friday prayers in Teheran. He severely criticized the country’s judiciary, dominated by Islamic fundamentalists, as a “Mafia Organization”. 
The security council’s ban was issued late so that some newspapers still carried reports on the Ayatollah’s com-ments the following day. "Noruz" issued several blank pages where they had wanted to print coverage of reac-tions to Taheri’s comments. (Source: dpa, 11.07.02)

Serious Clashes in Teheran 
There have been serious clashes in Teheran between dem-onstrators and police and radical Islamists, on the third anniversary of the student unrests in the capital city.
HB TEHERAN. The grounds of the college were cordoned off by security forces. According to eye witnesses special police units had then used tear gas and had managed to disperse the masses by the evening. Some police officers were injured. The student news agency ISNA reported that the demonstrators had called for the release of political prisoners as well as a departure from the policy of uncon-ditional support of the Palestinians. The Ministry for the Interior had banned all demonstrations. At the beginning of July 1999 hundreds of thousands of students had pro-tested in the university grounds against the restrictions on freedom of opinion after many newspapers, critical of the regime, had been banned and leading journalists had been imprisoned. Press laws had also been tightened up. At least 6 students died in clashes with fundamentalist supporters and police and hundreds of demonstrators were arrested as “counter-revolutionaries” and “nonbelievers”. (Source: Han-delsblatt, 10. 7. 02)

10 Years Prison Sentence and Dancing Ban for Famous Iranian Dancer 
The well known Iranian dancer, Mohammad Khordadian, has been sentenced to a 10 year suspended prison sentence by a court in Teheran. The dance teacher, who also holds American citizenship, may also not leave Iran for 10 years. This was recently revealed by the Iranian government. Khordadian was accused by the court of immoral behavior. He had had a bad influence on the country’s youth through his shows, made in the USA but receivable via satellite in Iran. Any form of dancing, especially with the opposite sex, is banned in Islamic Iran. (Source: dpa, 08. 07.02)

Al-Khazraji was involved in the genocide against the Kurds
On 11th June 2002, the Police Chief of Ringsted, Den-mark, in charge of investigating Nizar Al-Khazraji's crimes, told Western Denmark TV that he had no doubt that Al-Khazraji had involved in the genocide against the Kurds in the light of new evidences came to light during investigations. He added that the evidences, so far col-lected, are substantial. They have necessitated the review of his asylum application and sending his file to Public Prosecutor. 
It is worth mentioning that Birgitte Vestberg, a 60-year-old lady, has been authorised by Denmark Internal Ministry to deal with claims against 16 people accused of War Crimes. Nizar Al-Khazraji is the most seriously accused one of them. Before taking this post, Birgitte Vestberg was a Public Prosecutor in the area of Audinsa. She is one of the strong personalities known in Denmark and is known as a strong law enforcer. She has dealt with serious and com-plicated crimes successfully; she has a good record. She is known as hard and uncompromising with criminals, espe-cially those involved in murder and bodily harms. 
Sunday Avison, the weekly newspaper, which enters every home in Denmark, writes each week about a famous per-son in Denmark. Last week, on 9th of this month, it wrote about personality of Birgitte Vestberg who has been ap-pointed to prosecute 16 people accused of war crimes and live in Denmark. 
Also an investigation by Niels Wesbberg on Nizar Al-Khazraji published in Ekstrabldet Newspaper on 11th of this month. This Newspaper is important and well known in Denmark. This investigation proves that Nezar Al-Khazraji involved in the planning of Anfal Campaigns and the use of Chemical Attacks against the Kurds. He has caused the disappearance of 182 thousand Kurds and gas attack against the City of Halabja where more than 5000 women, children and men murdered at the same moment. 
The investigation includes videotape evidence against Khazraji. This videotape is about a military seminar by Younis Muhammad Zerab, the commander of 5th division of Iraqi Army. He proves that Nazar Al-Khazraji; like Saddam Hussein and his cousin, Ali Majid 'the Chemical Man', had a strong hand in the strategic military movement against the Kurds. 
22 Organizations, most of them are Kurdish, have supported this campaign and provided witnesses and evi-dences to the police. (Source: Kurdish Media, 19.06.02)

Kurdish leader wary of US plans
A top Kurdish leader opposed to Baghdad, Massoud Barzani of the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), has ruled out participation in any covert action to topple Iraqi Presi-dent Saddam Hussein.
Mr Barzani was reacting to reports that US President George W Bush has authorised CIA undercover operations to overthrow the Iraqi leader.
"Let me be very clear on this, we do not support any covert military action. We would like transparency and clarity," Mr Barzani said at his headquarters in Salahuddin, over-looking the Kurdish regional capital Arbil.
A political agreement on the future of Iraq and Kurdish rights should be reached before taking any positions, he said.
"The Iraqi issue in general and the Kurdish issue in par-ticular won't be solved by a military or a covert action. It is a political question."
The KDP and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), led by Jalal Talabani, have been ruling Iraqi Kurdistan since 1991, outside Baghdad's control.
In 1992, their joint regional parliament demanded a federal relationship with Baghdad as a solution for the Kurdish issue.
Since the Bush administration began speaking of its desire to see Saddam Hussein toppled the Kurds have refrained from any action or statement that might provoke Iraqi reprisals.

Kurdish concerns
Mr Barzani set out rigorous conditions for joining any operation aimed at replacing the regime in Baghdad.
"If a federal solution for the Kurdish issue within a democ-ratic, pluralistic and parliamentary Iraq is guaranteed, a dictatorial and military alternative is not imposed on us and regional interference is not allowed - then the Kurds will play a major role."
If a US-led effort to oust the Iraqi leader went ahead with-out meeting these conditions the Kurds would remain on the sidelines, he said.
But he added that the Kurds would "not be able to stop the Americans from going ahead with their plan".

Federal solution
Iraq's neighbours, especially Turkey, have expressed con-cern about the possibility of a Kurdish state emerging in the event of a US attack.
Mr Barzani played down such an outcome, saying: "We have not asked for an independent state".
"According to our experience [of self-rule], federalism is the best solution for our problems."
He said the Kurds were ready to discuss security "reassur-ances or guarantees" with their neighbours.
"But if these countries want to exploit the situation, and interfere in our internal affairs, we will definitely resist and stop them. We Kurds don't interfere in their internal af-fairs."  (Source: BBC News, 18.06.02)

I hear a tortured child
The star witness against the government of Iraq hobbled into the room, her legs braced with clumsy metal callipers. "Anna" had been tortured two years ago. She is now four years old.
Her father, Ali, is a thick-set Iraqi who used to work for Saddam's psychopathic son, Uday. Some time after the bungled assassination of Uday, Ali fell under suspicion. 
He fled north, to the Kurdish safe haven policed by Western fighter planes, but leaving his wife and daughter behind in Baghdad. 
So the secret police came for his wife. Where is he? They tortured her. And when she didn't break, they tortured his daughter. 
"When did you last see your father? Has he phoned? Has he been in contact?" They half-crushed the toddler's feet. 
Now, she doesn't walk, she hobbles, and Ali fears that Saddam's men have crippled his daughter for life. So Ali talked to us.
I have been to Baghdad a number of times. Being in Iraq is like creeping around inside someone else's migraine. The fear is so omnipresent you could almost eat it. No one talks.
So listening to Ali speak freely was a revelation. He is not exactly a contender to be the next Archbishop of Canter-bury. 
He has the heft of an enforcer. He told me that he had tortured for the regime. But I don't think he was lying to us. 

'Faked funerals' 
Ali talked about the paranoid frenzy that rules Baghdad - the tortures, the killings, the corruption, the crazy gangster violence of Saddam and his two sons.
And the faking of the mass baby funerals. 
You may have seen them on TV. Small white coffins pa-rading through the streets of Baghdad on the roofs of taxis, an angry crowd of mourners, condemning Western sanc-tions for killing the children of Iraq.
Usefully, the ages of the dead babies - "three days old", "four days old" - are written in English on the coffins. I wonder who did that. 
Ali gave us the inside track on the racket. There aren't enough dead babies around. So the regime stores them for a mass funeral. 
He said that he was friends with a taxi driver - he gave his name - whose son had a position in the regime. 
Ali continued, he told me that he had to go to Najaf - a town 160km (100 miles) from Baghdad - in order to bring children's bodies from various freezers there, and that the smell was unbearable.
They used to collect children's bodies and put them in freezers for two, three or even six or seven months - God knows - until the smell got unbearable. 
Then, they arrange the mass funerals. The logic being, the more dead babies, the better for Saddam. That way, he can weaken public support in the West for sanctions.
That means that parents who have lost a baby can't bury it until the regime says so. 
So how could it be that people would put up with this sickening exploitation of grief?

A murder story
Ali told another story. He had seen Uday kill with his own eyes. This was some years ago, before the assassination attempt left Saddam's oldest son half-paralysed and impo-tent.
Uday's lust is famous in Baghdad. He wanted a woman who played tennis at Baghdad's Sports Club and he and Ali went round to the club. 
As Uday was turning into the car park, a tennis ball came over the fence and bounced against the car of the woman he desired. 
The tennis player came into the car park to retrieve the ball, apologised to the woman. Maybe there was a bit of flirting - that does happen at tennis courts, even in Eng-land.
From his car Uday watched the two of them. Enraged, he took out a wooden cosh and beat the tennis player's brains out. 
And then - get this - a few days later, the dead man's rela-tives apologised to Uday for the distress their son had caused him.
Incredible? I don't think so. 
In northern Iraq - the only part of the country where people can speak freely - we met six other witnesses who had direct experience of child torture, including another of Saddam's enforcers - now in a Kurdish prison - who told us that an interrogator could do anything:
"We could make a kebab out of the child if we wanted to." And then he chuckled. 
In that environment, with that background noise of fear, it is not impossible to imagine that the government of Iraq could have conned the world, inventing numbers of dead babies that the gullible - and that includes the United Na-tions - accept as reliable.
While we were in the north of Iraq, the chairman of the Great Britain Iraq Society, Labour MP George Galloway, was in Baghdad. 
He popped up on Iraqi TV and bared his soul. "When I hear the word Iraq," he said, "I hear someone calling my name." 
I don't. When I hear the word Iraq, I hear a tortured child, screaming.  (Source: BBC News, 22.06.02)

Death under torture
The SHRC has recorded three cases of death under torture during this year. The authorities did nothing to justify the death of the detainees except for one case where the de-tainee is blamed for alleged suicide. The three cases are: 

1. Muhammed Shukri ‘Aloush Qadir: a Kurd who die-don the day of his detention in the custody  station in Jandiris on May 25,2001. His corpse was not delivered to his family till July 19,2001. The police that arrested him in the context of investigating a theft crime claimed that he hanged himself committing suicide. It is believed, howe-ver, that the inhuman treatment led to his death a few hours after his arrest.

2. Muhammad Mustafa Sanoon: He was arrested when he was a student in the early eighties along with thou-sands of other detainees for political causes at that time. His corpse was delivered to his relatives after twenty years of detention, on July 22, 2001. Taking into consideration the torture that was used exten-sively and the severe deterioration of the state of the political detainees who spent long periods in prison, during which they experienced torture and maltreat-ment and were infected by various diseases as a result of malnutrition, leanness and pestilences, it is likely that the death of the detainee at this age (the forties) was the result of long-germ detention under the above-mentioned circumstances.

3. Muhammad Hasan Nassar: The authorities did not bother about explaining his detention when he was 52 years old. He was detained although he was afflicted with amnesia as a result of Alzheimer, when he retur-ned to his family after having had permission from the relevant authorities. The SHRC regards his detention and torture an outrageous case of cruelty that requires investigation and calling to account those who com-mitted that deed, noting that the traces of torture were manifest on the detainee’s body when his corpse was delivered to his family on (Source: SHRC, 27.06.02)

Two Kurdish Bodies Found in Truck – 
117 Illegal Immigrants on Italian Island 
Two Kurds have died while attempting to get to Italy on board a vehicle loaded with water melons. Their bodies were discovered when the vehicle arrived at the southern Italian port of Brindisi on route from Patras in Greece. The Italian news agency ANSA said that the cause of death was not initially known. Two other Kurds who were hid-den in the heavy load were taken to hospital in Brindisi with serious injuries.
117 illegal immigrants landed on the southern Italian island of Lampedusa on board a fishing boat. Police re-vealed that three human smugglers from the Sudan, Mo-rocco and the Lebanon were arrested. The refugees, whose origins were at first unknown, were all in good health. They were taken to a refugee camp.
The island, located between Sicily and North Africa, has in the past been a destination for illegal refugee transpor-tation. Refugee smugglers take thousands of people every year over the Mediterranean to Italy from Africa and Asia. Many refugees drown. The Italian government recently said they would in future use marines as a deterrent. (Source:dpa,01.07.02)
 
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