Workers’ Party of Ireland

Head Office: 24a-25 Hill Street, Dublin 1, Ireland

Tel: ++353-1-8740716

To:          The Central Committee,

               Communist Party, Turkey

5th June 2015

Dear Comrades,

The Workers’ Party of Ireland sends warm comradely greetings to the Communist Party, Turkey, and extends its best wishes, solidarity and support to the Communist Party in the parliamentary elections to be held on 7th June 2015. The WPI recognises that this election takes place in difficult circumstances and in the face of great provocations by the reactionary and repressive AKP regime and its ever-increasing authoritarian measures.

This misogynist, anti-worker, anti-people regime which acts to stifle democracy and to create a climate of fear wishes to confirm Turkey on the capitalist development path. The prison sentence imposed on the director of Sol magazine, the violent repression of protest, the anti-secularism, including the introduction of compulsory religious education into schools and the conversion of many secondary schools into religious schools, the ban on strikes, the dismissal of workers, the attacks on trade unions, the physical attacks on students, workers and young people are all manifestations of the vile character of this regime.

This was most recently exhibited by the outrageous display of force employed by the regime to prevent the May Day celebrations in Taksim Square and the physical attacks on and unlawful detentions of members of the Communist Party, Turkey, and, in particular, the detention of comrades Ali Adıgüzel, Deniz Sinan Tunaboylu and Bahtiyar Şahin who were falsely charged with serious offences and threatened with long sentences of imprisonment. The Workers’ Party of Ireland demands the unconditional and immediate release of these comrades. 

The Workers’ Party of Ireland salutes the Turkish communists in their ongoing struggle against religious fundamentalism, obscurantism and reaction. We believe that the Communist Party, Turkey, through its struggles and mass political work, has demonstrated its commitment to the interests of Turkish workers, to the struggle for equality, to providing a clear class based alternative to the failed capitalist system, to ending the power of the Turkish bourgeoisie, to establishing workers’ power and to building a new socialist Turkey.

The struggle of the Communist Party, Turkey, is also our struggle. We wish our comrades in the Communist Party, Turkey, success in the impending parliamentary elections and in your continuing work.

With comradely greetings,

Michael Donnelly,

President

John Lowry

General Secretary

Gerry Grainger

International Secretary

On behalf of the Central Executive Committee

Workers’ Party of Ireland