An imprisoned Kurdish rebel leader won't meet with his lawyers or family until he is given a health exam by independent doctors and greater access to his attorney, a lawyer said Wednesday.
| "I'm tellin' youse, I ain't gonna meet with my lawyer until I can meet with my lawyer. An' I want examined..." |
Abdullah Ocalan, who is being held on the prison island of Imrali off Istanbul, also is demanding daily access to all newspapers and magazines published in Turkey, to be able to send and receive letters, and to make limited telephone calls.
| "An' I want a pony, an' a hat like Stevey has!" |
In the years since he has been captured, "he has been kept under extraordinarily heavy isolation," said Dogan Erbas, one of Ocalan's attorneys. Ocalan "will not meet with his lawyers or his family until certain conditions are improved," Erbas said in a telephone interview. Ocalan, head of the Kurdistan Workers Party or PKK, which now calls itself KADEK, is serving a life sentence for treason and is the island's only inmate. |