Istanbul hosts meeting on jailed Syrian women

ISTANBUL is set to host an international conference today to raise awareness for the suffering of women and young girls imprisoned by the Syrian regime.

The Conscience Movement will hold the conference with participants from 45 countries, including Syria, Britain, South Africa, Ecuador, Qatar, Ukraine, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Brazil. Among the participants are Baroness Pola Uddin, a member of Britain’s House of Lords, Zwelivelile Mandlesizwe Dalibhunga Mandela, chief of the Mvezo Clan Traditional Council in South Africa and grandson of Nelson Mandela, and Ecuadorian parliamentarian Ana Belen Marin Aguirre.

Speaking to Anadolu Agency (AA), Yavuz Dede, the movement’s spokesman, said the conference aims to draw international attention to the suffering of women imprisoned amid the Syrian civil war. Dede said the Conscience Movement is an international initiative largely devoted to the release of women and children arrested since 2011, the start of the Syrian civil war. Dede said the movement is supported by more than 2,000 nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and thousands of people from 110 countries.

A statement by the movement said more than 13,500 Syrian women have been detained since the war started in March 2011, adding that more than 7,000 women remain in prison, often subjected to torture, rape or sexual violence. The movement is an international initiative that was founded last March after an all-female international convoy gained international success by raising awareness for women imprisoned by the Bashar Assad regime in Syria. On March 6, the international Conscience Convoy started a three-day journey with 55 buses from Istanbul that ended in Hatay, near the Syrian border.