AK Party activist tells how she was attacked during campaign
Yasemin Kenan, a young member of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), told reporters how she was slapped and insulted by two women while she was distributing leaflets about the upcoming constitutional referendum.
Kenan was behind a stand filled with leaflets informing the public about the referendum when two women, who oppose the referendum campaign, approached her in the southern city of Antalya on Sunday.
Speaking to reporters at the scene of the attack, after a mother and her 38-year-old daughter were brought to the court for assault, the victim Yasemin Kenan said the women swore at her before one of them tore her hijab.
Kenan is a member of the youth branch of the AK Party campaigning for a "yes" vote in the referendum. Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, who also serves as a lawmaker for Antalya, denounced the attack and called it "brutish."
The victim, a university student, said she was with fellow activists when the two women approached and started swearing at them. "I saw the older woman snatching the leaflets and tearing them apart. She was shouting at my friends. I couldn't hear her at first as she was far away. She then came closer and I heard her saying, ‘you are traitors, go away from here.'" When she saw me, she first insulted and then slapped me," the young woman in hijab said. "She tried to pull my hijab off and it got torn. She pulled my hair and trying to escape her, I grabbed her too. We both hit the ground. Then, others around intervened and took her away," she recounted.
Kenan said she filed a complaint against the two women while the women in turn filed a criminal complaint against Kenan and the other activists. "I don't know what really happened. They claimed that we forced them to take the leaflets but that's not the case. We can't really force anyone to accept them and besides, I am really on good terms with people who will vote ‘no.' I think this is a sign of intolerance on her part," she said. Esra Özkoç, head of the AK Party's Antalya women's branch who accompanied her at the press conference yesterday, said what the young woman suffered was "a hate crime." "Members of our party never insulted or belittled anyone campaigning for ‘no' and we follow a democratic course for our campaign. We hope the perpetrators will receive the heaviest punishment possible for this attack," she told reporters.
Kenan was behind a stand filled with leaflets informing the public about the referendum when two women, who oppose the referendum campaign, approached her in the southern city of Antalya on Sunday.
Speaking to reporters at the scene of the attack, after a mother and her 38-year-old daughter were brought to the court for assault, the victim Yasemin Kenan said the women swore at her before one of them tore her hijab.
Kenan is a member of the youth branch of the AK Party campaigning for a "yes" vote in the referendum. Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, who also serves as a lawmaker for Antalya, denounced the attack and called it "brutish."
The victim, a university student, said she was with fellow activists when the two women approached and started swearing at them. "I saw the older woman snatching the leaflets and tearing them apart. She was shouting at my friends. I couldn't hear her at first as she was far away. She then came closer and I heard her saying, ‘you are traitors, go away from here.'" When she saw me, she first insulted and then slapped me," the young woman in hijab said. "She tried to pull my hijab off and it got torn. She pulled my hair and trying to escape her, I grabbed her too. We both hit the ground. Then, others around intervened and took her away," she recounted.
Kenan said she filed a complaint against the two women while the women in turn filed a criminal complaint against Kenan and the other activists. "I don't know what really happened. They claimed that we forced them to take the leaflets but that's not the case. We can't really force anyone to accept them and besides, I am really on good terms with people who will vote ‘no.' I think this is a sign of intolerance on her part," she said. Esra Özkoç, head of the AK Party's Antalya women's branch who accompanied her at the press conference yesterday, said what the young woman suffered was "a hate crime." "Members of our party never insulted or belittled anyone campaigning for ‘no' and we follow a democratic course for our campaign. We hope the perpetrators will receive the heaviest punishment possible for this attack," she told reporters.