10/07/2025 | Writer: Kaos GL
A press statement was made calling for the release of Hivda, Sinem and Doğan who were arrested for “possibly participating” in the Pride March.
On June 29th, Sunday, LGBTI+ activists were detained during the 23rd Istanbul Pride March. While 50 of the 53 detainees were released with a ban on leaving the country, 3 people were arrested.
A press statement was made calling for the release of Hivda, Sinem and Doğan, who were arrested on the grounds that they were “likely to participate” in the Pride March.
“Even if the state, which is terrified of our coming together and the unification of rights struggles, pours all its mechanisms and hatred on us, we will shout without stopping even if there is only one of us left!” the press statement read.
The full statement is as follows:
"Hivda, Sinem and Doğan, who were detained on Sunday, June 29, 2025 for allegedly participating in the 23rd Istanbul Pride March, were arrested without any legal basis.
We gathered here today to let our friends, who have been wronged and arrested on a possibility, know that they are not alone. We cannot hear their voices or see their faces. We will continue our comradeship with the letters we write.
The state, afraid to stand behind the political reasons they cited for the arrests, is subjecting our friends to various rights violations. The prison administration, which gave up on the imposition of strip searches at the entrance of the prison after our friends' resistance, now imposes the forensic ward. Our friends, whose demands to stay in the political ward were rejected, are kept in solitary confinement without ventilation and are only allowed to ventilate for 1 hour a day. We will increase our solidarity and struggle while our imprisoned friends resist inside. We want our friends to be released as soon as possible.
We call on everyone who is subjected to injustice, violence and discrimination in this geography to be the voice of our friends!
As we are days away from the 10th anniversary of the Suruç massacre, we know the holistic cowardly policies of the state, which has declared the next 10 years as the family year, by heart and we are not afraid! Even if the state, which is terrified of us coming together, of the unification of the struggles for rights, pours all its mechanisms and hatred on us, we will shout non-stop, even if there is only one person left!
We are here! We are not leaving! We are not afraid! We are not backing down!
We will make noise every day until we get our friends!"
Tags: human rights
