On 14th of May 2012, early in the morning at 05 am 45 people have been taken into custody including animal liberators, ecologists, by concurrently operations in Istanbul, Tekirdağ, Trabzon, Muğla, Şarköy and İzmir. The reason was on the 1st of May near 28 banks and multinational capitalist companies’ branches including Starbucks, McDonalds, Burger King were damaged by some anarchist activists.

Freedom to anarchist Mayday prisoners

On 14th of May 2012, early in the morning at 05 am 45 people have been taken into custody including animal liberators, ecologists, by concurrently operations in Istanbul, Tekirdağ, Trabzon, Muğla, Şarköy and İzmir. The reason was on the 1st of May near 28 banks and multinational capitalist companies’ branches including Starbucks, McDonalds, Burger King were damaged by some anarchist activists.

At an unearthly hour, houses were raided and turned upside down; laptops, phones and various magazines and documents were confiscated. They were quickly presented to the “anti terror” police teams at the Vatan Police Department in Istanbul. For four days they were questioned here, commited for trial and arrested. 20 people out of 45 were released from the police department, while 25 were sent to the prosecutor. 15 out of these 25 were sent to the court with the demand of arrest; 6 were released pending trial while 9 were arrested and sent to Metris T Type Prison in Istanbul.

In the second wave of police operations in the morning of 28th of May, seven people in total were taken to custody by the police and borught to Vatan Police Department from Istanbul, Eskişehir, Ankara and Bursa. After four days of interrogation in custody first they were sent to the prosecutor and then to the court. While two were released, five people were sent to Metris T Type Prison. The total number of people in prison has risen from 9 to 14.

The police and the prosecutors went beyond questioning the case in 1st of May and running for declaring the anarchists as “terrorists”. This is why some people were tried to be loosened in the interrogation rooms and the resistance of the people were tried to be broken by cross-examinations. In this process, three people were fooled by the lawyers who work for the police and were sent from the Bar; they were tricked and accepted being informants and they caused some people to be arrested.

The police tried to do whatever possible to link the attacks with some anarchist, animal liberator or ecologist organisations and they tried to criminalise these organisations by asking biassed questions.

The contents and the extent of this investigation which was warranted by the Special Court is still vague because of the secrecy order. They want to try and terrorise the anarchists by trying them using the Anti-Terror Laws (TMK), rather than trying them forthe economic sabotages in the 1st of May. It is told that there will be 3rd, 4th and 5th waves of the operations. It looks like the police will go on with their anarchist witch hunt. While the investigation file is still kept secret, it is eagerly anticipated what anarchists will be accused of and what surprises will born out the indictments.

Solidarity blog (in english-turkish-deutsch-francais):

https://operationblackscare.wordpress.com