KESK Leader Özgen Released; More Arrests Follow

Officials Thursday arrested 22 members of the Confederation of Public Sector Trade Unions (KESK) who were detained on Monday's crackdown as part of the probe into the Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK,) with another six of them arrested on Friday morning, while they also released KESK leader Lami Özgen.

The six KESK members who were arrested on Friday morning were among 13 detainees transferred to court the same day.

The past few months' consecutive operations against the KESK represent an attack on its struggle as a union, Özgen said while on his way out of the courtroom.

"These operations [represent] conscious, intentional and organized [attacks] developed against revolutionary and democratic patriots within the KESK and the KESK's legitimate and material struggle as a union," he said.

"We know these [attacks] are geared toward pushing us back, subjugating us and criminalizing, defaming, internalizing and neutralizing the struggle for union rights and freedoms. We come from such a tradition of struggle, however, that we will never bow to such pressure," Özgen said. (NV)