Yekta Uzunoglu

Yekta Uzunoglu
Born (1953-05-10) 10 May 1953
Diyarbakır, Turkey
Occupation Writer,
translator,
physician,
entrepreneur
Nationality Kurdish

Yekta Uzunoglu or (Kurdish: Yekta Geylanî‎) (b. 1953 Silvan, Diyarbakır, Turkey), is a contemporary Kurdish writer, translator, physician and entrepreneur.[1] In 1971, he moved to Paris to study French. From 1973 to 1979, thanks to scholarship granted to him by the last Kurdish prince Celadet Bedir Khan, he studied general medicine at the Charles University in Prague.

He became involved in the resistance movement against the communist regime of Czechoslovakia after 1968. When in 1975 the regime of Gustáv Husák began to hand Kurdish students over to Saddam Hussein, he was among a group of Kurdish students who organized an illegal hunger strike in the compound of the Swedish embassy in Prague. During his studies, he has also been publishing his writings on Kurds in an illegal samizdat publishing house "ARARAT", which he found in 1976.

After completing his studies, he was expelled from the Czech republic and returned to Paris. He dropped the research scholarship in prestigious Pasteur Institute, and instead got involved in Doctors without borders as a volunteer (he set up numerous field hospitals there) in Iranian Kurdistan, that has been currently rebelling against newly established Islamic republic of Iran. For his involvement in the Kurdish issue, Turkey revoked his passport, and he has been granted a refugee status in Germany in 1981. Two years later, he was one of the founding members of Institut Kurde de Paris and also Kurdische Institut in Bonn, which he led until 1988 as a director.

After the Velvet Revolution, he returned to Prague, where he became a successful entrepreneur. His career ended prematurely in 1994, when he was arrested and unsuccessfully tried for next 12 years, when he was acquitted of guilt, after all accusations were proven to be false. He received the František Kriegel prize for civic courage in 2006.

Works

He has participated in editing of a Kurdish grammar book, translated parts of Bible and works of Karel Čapek into Kurdish and Kurdish poetry into Czech. He has also cooperated with the Kurdish Institute of Paris.

Books

Quest for Justice

On 13. September 1994, Yekta Uzunoglu has been detained by the Czech police (officer leading the operation, Josef Opava, has been later sentenced to 14 years as a member of the infamous "Berdych's gang") and unlawfully (Czech law allowed maximum 24 hours of detention) held for nearly 72 hours without any charges being laid against him. Afterwards, according to press statement of police officer Jiří Gregor, he has been accused of "illegal arms and drugs trading" and remanded in custody.

One month later, previous charges have been dropped and he was now being charged of "preparing of murders, unlawful possession of guns, multiple frauds and torture", all based on accusations laid by "Göksel Otan", supposed Turkish citizen living in the Czech Republic.

Until 10. April 1995, all of the accusations were proven to be false, expect of the torture. Mr. Uzunoglu has been purportedly, with the help of other detainees, torturing Göksel Otan on 9. September and additional 2 people (one of them his own cousin) in the evening, when he was detained. At this time, according to court files, one of the accused persons (Uzunoglu's nephew) has been already detained for several hours. However, even this version of the lawsuit has not been accepted by the responsible court.

Betweentimes, Mr. Uzunoglu's remand has been prolonged four times (last time by the Constitutional court of the Czech republic). During this time, Mr. Uzunoglu had to endure unlawful mistreatment, as then minister of justice Jan Ruml later confessed.

Later in 1996, Mr. Uzunoglu has been given the German citizenship, while still in custody in Prague. He has been finally released on 12. March 1997.

During the following trial, Mr. Uzunoglu managed to prove, that the identity of "Göksel Otan" is false and that he has been using false passport for at least 25 years. Göksel then started to say that his true name is "Gurkan Gönen". According to Ministry of interior inquiry, Gönen has been a long-term informer of communist STB and after Velvet revolution worked as an informer for cpt. Horák, policeman leading the prosecution of Mr. Uzunoglu.

Final version of the lawsuit, literally same as the rejected one from year 1995, have been filed on 18. January 2000.

In January 2003, the charge has been moved to court in Turkey, which subsequently returned it to Czech court 9 months later.

On 25. September 2003, Czech court stopped the prosecution of Dr. Uzunoglu for humanitarian reasons, but both the prosecutor and Mr. Uzunoglu did not accept this decision, the latter saying he demands to be cleared of all accusations.

On 3. March 2006, important figures of the Czech public life published an open letter called "Žalujeme" ("We accuse", similar to Émile Zola's "J'accuse ...!", which helped end the infamous Dreyfus affair in France 100 years before), namely Pavel Dostál, Táňa Fischerová, František Janouch, Karel Jech, Květa Jechová, Svatopluk Karásek, Jaroslav Kořán, Dana Němcová, Karel Schwarzenberg, Jiřina Šiklová, Věněk Šilhán, Libuše Šilhánová, Jaromír Štětina, Petruška Šustrová.

In April 2006, Dr. Yekta Uzunoglu has been given the František Kriegel prize for civic courage.

In March 2007, Mr. Uzunoglu started an 11 days long hunger strike against his prolonged process, many important public figures, including former president Václav Havel, joined him symbolically for one day.

On 29. March 2007, Mr. Uzunoglu has been sentenced to two years in prison, but he immediately appealed the sentence, which he called "fashizoid". Human rights organizations like Amnesty International declared their support to Mr. Uzunoglu.

On 31. July 2007, Prague's Court of appeals accepted Uzunoglu's appeal and finally cleared him of all charges.

Allegations of the involvement of the Turkish government

Yekta alleges that the police charges against him were part of a conspiracy orchestrated by the Turkish government under Tansu Çiller and former communists including former Czechoslovak foreign minister Jaromin Johanes who now lives in Turkey.[4]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Fair trial concerns in the case of Yekta Uzunoglu Archived 13 April 2007 at the Wayback Machine.
  2. ↑ SKC01 – Úplné zobrazení záznamu
  3. ↑ Editions and Publications on the YU's web Archived 20 December 2010 at WebCite
  4. ↑ http://www.pen-kurd.org/kurdi/yekta-geylani/tirkiye-li-basur-talane-dike.html Archived 20 December 2010 at WebCite

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Yekta Uzunoglu.
  1. A letter from prominent Czech personalities
  2. Fair trial concerns in the case of Yekta Uzunoglu, Amnesty International, March 2007.
  3. Statement for the 2006 František Kriegel Prize.
  4. On The Role of Turkey in Iraqi Kurdistan, Yekta Uzunoglu, Kurdish PEN, March 2007.
  5. Yekta Uzunoglu seeks to clear his name in Czech courts, radio.cz
  6. Yekta Uzunoglu memoirs book cover, blueturtle.cz
  7. Primary human identity, idnes.cz
  8. The sale of Czech L-159 light fighters/trainers in the scope of Iraqi-Kurdish relations, idnes.cz
  9. Czech: Kurdish-born doctor Yekta Uzunoglu given suspended sentence , ekurd.net
  10. Yekta Uzunoglu , babylon.com
  11. Yekta Uzunoglu , androidillustrated.com
  12. Radio Praha: Yekta Uzunoglu Seeks To Clear , Radio Praha
  13. Yekta Uzunoglu and Questions surrounding Underground Ararat publishers , Wiener Jahrbuch für Kurdische Studien
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