Dear Minister, 

PINAR SELEK
 
I am writing to you with an urgent request. Please reconsider the case of Pinar Selek. She MUST be given restitution, her freedom from pursuit by the Turkish state, and her right to reside peacefully in her own country.
 
Pinar Selek was, in the first place, in 1997, wrongly arrested and accused of an offence that she never committed, and with which she had no connection. There was in fact no evidence that the event was a criminal act rather than an accident. The evidence against Pinar was retrospectively fabricated by an informer who was paid to do so. Pinar was tortured in custody, and has already served a term of imprison-ment. She has been acquitted in several subsequent trials, but each time the judgment has been overturned, without new evidence, by a higher court. Pinar has necessarily been living abroad now for some years, but I have learned that the Turkish government may be seeking her extradition.
 
This case is not being treated, in truth, as a matter of justice. It has been from the start, and continues to be today, a devise to intimidate not only Pinar herself but also other intellectuals, academics and writers whose views may not always coincide with those of the government. This is not only a matter of justice for this individual woman. It is an issue of human rights in which the Turkish state's reputation as a democracy is at stake. As someone who feels great love and admiration for Turkey, I call on you with the utmost urgency to free Pinar Selek from all charges and rehabilitate her fully for residence in her homeland.
 
Yours sincerely,
Dr. Cynthia Cockburn, Honorary Professor, University of Warwick