Yüksel's “Auntie Perihan” speaks

Video footage has emerged of the assault by police teams on the 1 May event in Kızılay’s Yüksel Street. In the footage captured by the Chamber of Architects’ Ankara Branch security camera, the police are seen first to have sprayed the small crowd with pressurised water. Subsequently, the team in which plain clothes officers were also included was seen to push citizens who did not flee but simply held their ground in the street. The way 75-year old Perihan Pulat struck her head on iron railings as she was flung to the ground while on her feet by a young plain-clothes police officer can be identified in the footage.

A press conference on the assault in Yüksel attended by administrators of the Human Rights Association, Turkish Human Rights Foundation and the Health and Social Service Workers Union was held yesterday at the Ankara Medical Chamber.

“Whether we die or remain alive!”

Addressing the meeting, Pulat described those horrific moments. Pulat, speaking of how a police officer she described as the “fringed police officer” dragged her to the ground without any warning and hit her head hard on the ground, commented as follows, “Whether we die or remain alive, we will see how the peoples through resistance bring about peace, how they will attain workers power and workers will move into this world where they consume what they produce. We have been engaged in a struggle for a very long time and let nobody worry, never mind my age, I will live until I’m one hundred and we’ll see good days. We’ll continue to struggle with all of our comrades, our comrades who are putting their bodies on the line, with our hearts and faith and all together in universality because we embrace all the workers of the world. Until the last breath.”

Human Rights Association Executive Board member Dr Nihat Bulut, indicating that Pulat’s head had sustained serious injury in the assault, conveyed the information: “It is clear that the discernible hyperemia which Perihan Pulat suffered on her forehead and the swelling and bruising which occurred in various areas of her face and around both eyes resulted from a violent blow. It has additionally been determined that, as a result of the violent pulling of Gülnaz Bozkurt’s hair, the hair on the scalp on the top of her head has been pulled out by the roots leaving localised baldness. Bruising occurred to Nazan Bozkurt’s facial region and her right eye.”

Bulut, pointing out that the group which was dispersing following the 1 May celebrations was subjected to police violence in front of the Maltepe multi-storey car park, said, “Two people were beaten and arrested with tear gas sprayed at them from close range and also had tear gas sprayed at them in the arrest vehicle. People who reacted to the incident also came under attack and one person was slapped and manhandled by the police commander himself. However hard it is made, we will follow this up.”

Criminal complaint filed

Victims of police violence in Yüksel Street, Perihan Pulat, Acun Karadağ, Nazan Bozkurt and Gülnaz Bozkurt, filed a criminal complaint yesterday with Ankara Republic Chief Prosecution. With Pulat saying in her statement, “I complain about the Security Branch officers, Rapid Reaction Force officers, the Governor of Ankara and those who gave the instructions who even wilfully turned an action they were capable of controlling into torture, and especially the police officer who shoved me and made my face unrecognisable,” Acun Karadağ, conversely, commented in her statement, “The police staged this attack even though they knew I had a cardiac pacemaker. I could have died with the force of the water.”

YÜKSEL STREET’S “AUNTIE PERİHAN”

The name of 75-year-old retired judge, Perihan Pulat, is public knowledge in progressive circles in Ankara. Pulat, who for years has taken her place at the front with her home-made placards on many actions, events and commemorations, is “Auntie Perihan” to the Yüksel Street regulars.

Yüksel'in 'Perihan Teyze'si konuştu: Son nefesimize kadar mücadele