At the time of her death, she weighed just 30 kilograms after months on only water and vitamins.
PES President Sergei Stanishev said:
“Erdogan’s tailored justice took another innocent victim. It’s atrocious people to die defending their right to a fair trial in Europe, in the 21st century.
Turkish people deserve democracy, civil liberties, and respect for the rule of law. All these are default rights that President Erdogan denies to his people. And people in Turkey are dying because of that.”
Before her martyr death, Ebru Timtik spent 2 years in jail, as she has been sentenced to 13 years and six months in prison after being convicted for membership of a terrorist organization. The unjust trial prompted her and a few other jailed lawyers to start a hunger strike in February. She was a member of the Contemporary Lawyers’ Association (CHD), a leftist attorney’s organization that was targeted by Erdogan’s authorities.
Prominent figures from both PES Member parties in Turkey reacted strongly after the death of Ebru Timtik. Republican People’s Party (CHP) İstanbul MP Gürsel Tekin said: “A politicized judiciary means a judiciary that has turned into an executioner.” The Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Diyarbakır MP Garo Paylan commented: “Ebru Timtik has been massacred by the tyrants in the government!”
The PES condemns the violence of the Istanbul police, which fired teargas and chased away hundreds of mourners at the burial of Ebru Timtik in the Northern part of Istanbul yesterday. European Socialists and Democrats were always standing against all unlawful detentions in Turkey as well as for the immediate release of the former co-chair of our member party HPD Selahattin Demirtaş, who is in prison for 4 years now facing endless series of trails.