Riad al-Turk

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Riad al-Turk ( Arabic رياض الترك Riyad at-Turk , * 1930 in Homs , Syria State , Syrian Republic ) is a Syrian opposition leader and democracy activist, who is also known as the “Wise Man of the Syrian Opposition”. He was a political prisoner for over 20 years. From its founding in 1973 to 2005, he was also General Secretary of the Syrian Democratic People's Party .

Life

Turk joined the Syrian Communist Party as a student . He graduated from the school of law. When he criticized the military government of Adib Chichakli , he was imprisoned for the first time in 1952; Turk was held in court for five months without charge and was tortured. He later wrote articles for the party's newspaper al-Nour and became the party's leading ideologist. In 1958 he was imprisoned again under Nasser , because he rejected the unification of Syria and Egypt in the United Arab Republic - here too he was tortured without a trial.

Turk headed the faction of the Communist Party that had a more positive attitude towards Arab nationalism , in contrast to the Kurdish general secretary Khalid Bakdash . After Bakdasch decided to join the party in the ruling National Progress Front in 1972 , Turk split off together with the party's Politburo and founded the Syrian Communist Party Politburo in 1973 ; the teacher and author Georges Sabra joined Turk.

Turk was arrested again on October 28, 1980 and served almost 18 years in prison under difficult conditions. He spent most of his time in solitary confinement and suffered regular torture . For the first thirteen years of imprisonment, he was forbidden from contact with family or friends, and was also denied information about his family, which was also the case for his two young daughters. He was only allowed to leave the solitary cell, which was hardly bigger than his body, three times a day to use a communal toilet. His only occupation at this time was collecting cereal grains that he found in the soup, which he only got once in the evening to use to draw paintings in his cell. Turk suffered increasingly from diseases such as diabetes and was denied treatment. He was released on May 30, 1998.

When Syrian President Hafes Assad died in June 2000, followed by his son Bashar , there was an outbreak of political debate and a democratic change called the Damascus Spring , in which Riad al-Turk took a leading role. His testimony at al-Jazeera in August 2001 that "the dictator [Assad] died" triggered new repression by the government, and on September 1, 2001, Turk was again on trial. His indictment before the State Security Court was considered an unfair trial. In June 2002 he was sentenced again to three years imprisonment for allegedly "attempting to illegally amend the constitution " - no consideration was given to his precarious health.

In 2005, Riyadh al-Turk was a signatory to the Damascus Declaration , a pro-democratic alliance of Syrian organizations.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Robin Wright: Dreams and Shadows, the Future of the Middle East . Penguin Press, New York 2008, ISBN 978-1-59420-111-0 , pp. 213 .
  2. ^ A b Wright: Dreams and Shadows. 2008, pp. 214-5.
  3. ^ Wright: Dreams and Shadows. 2008, p. 216.
  4. ^ Wright: Dreams and Shadows. 2008, p. 218.
personal data
SURNAME Turk, Riyadh al-
ALTERNATIVE NAMES al-Turk, Riyadh; Turk, Riyadh
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Syrian democracy activist
DATE OF BIRTH 1930
PLACE OF BIRTH Homs , Syria State , Syrian Republic