Justice Ministry: 23 people can share the same toilet in prison cell

Hacı Bişkin/ DUVAR

In response to a inquiry regarding squalid conditions in an Izmir prison where inmates were sleeping on the floor and where 23 people sharing the same toilet, the Ministry of Justice responded by saying that number of prisoners individually have enough time for sufficient toilet use. 

After an inmate detailed the grim conditions that he and other inmates are living in, left-leaning, pro-Kurdish People's Democratic Party (HDP) deputy Ömer Faruk Gergerlioğlu submitted an inquiry to the Ministry of Justice. 

The ministry responded by saying that a cell holds an average of 18 people, so prisoners individually have 65 minutes of bathroom time in a 24-hour period. 

One inmate at the Izmir prison said that in his particular dormitory cell there were 14 beds but 23 inmates, and that the inmates without beds were sleeping on the floor. He said that despite the fact that he and his wife were imprisoned in separate facilities in the same prison campus, they were not able to speak on the phone with each other for well over a year. He also said that the top of the garden in which the prisons are supposed be able to get fresh air is covered with wire meshing.