FREE SEBAHATTIN SOYLEMEZ!

To:  Friends of Sebahattin Soylemez

FREE SEBAHATTIN SOYLEMEZ!

Sebahattin was taken into custody by Immigration on Monday 27th June 2005. He was moved the same day to a holding centre at Eastern Docks in Dover. He was not allowed to collect any of his belongings nor say goodbye to his friends. All we know is that he was arrested under Section 28E of the Immigration Act.

Sebahattin was a well-liked member of the Kurdish community in the Hastings/St Leonards on Sea area (in the county of East Sussex, England) and at the time of his arrest was trying to establish an organisation for the Kurdish community called UNITED KURDISH ACTION. He helped to set up classes at Chapel Park Online to teach English and ran courses in IT. It would be a shame if he was not allowed to carry on the good work he was doing and was deported.

Sebahattin always claimed that he tried to set up a Kurdish organisation in Turkey, and for this was detained, questioned and beaten by the Turkish authorities. This was in April 2002. He believes that if he is deported he will be imprisoned and mistreated again because of his Kurdish ethnicity.

Amnesty International have said that people from Turkey who have sought asylum in the West should NOT be returned to that country.

Sebahattin was moved from Dover at the end of June and is now at Harmandsworth Immigration Removal Centre, near Heathrow Airport. A friend who visited him recently said that he is not feeling very well and that the place is like a prison and not well ventilated.

An up-to-date report about Harmandsworth was issued by the Home Office on 1st July 2005 in which it stated that 44 of the recommendations made by Anne Owers, the Chief Inspector of Prisons, in her previous report issued in 2000 have been ignored and a further 24 only partly achieved. It would seem that conditions there need to be improved.

Please sign our petition and forward it to as many people as possible.

Thank You

Sincerely,

The Undersigned

The FREE SEBAHATTIN SOYLEMEZ! Petition to Friends of Sebahattin Soylemez was created by and written by Stephen Jones (rojbas333@yahoo.co.uk).  This petition is hosted here at www.PetitionOnline.com as a public service. There is no endorsement of this petition, express or implied, by Artifice, Inc. or our sponsors. For technical support please use our simple Petition Help form.

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