Solidarity with LGBTI+ students and civil society in Turkey

SAIH, ISFiT and the Student Peace Prize condemn the sweeping wave of raids, detentions and website blockings carried out against LGBTI+ organisations and activists across Turkey this weekend. We stand in solidarity with our partners and the wider Turkish student and civil society movement.

A coordinated crackdown on civil society

Over the weekend, Turkish police raided the homes of LGBTI+ and HIV activists and the offices of LGBTI+/HIV associations in cities across the country, including Istanbul, Ankara, Izmir and Antalya. According to Kaos GL and international rights monitors, at least 50 activists were detained, including more than ten taken from raids on their homes, with the number rising throughout the operation.

Hours before the raids, courts in Istanbul ordered the blocking of websites and social media accounts belonging to LGBTI+ organisations, activists, journalists, women's organisations and student groups, among them Kaos GL, SPoD, Lambda Istanbul, Pink Life, Genç LGBTİ+, Muamma LGBTİ+, and ÜniKuir which is the network that connects LGBTI+ student clubs on university campuses across Turkey.

Authorities say the operation, dubbed "My Family is Safe," forms part of a wider government campaign under vague "morality" and "obscenity" charges targeting 162 people, nine associations and 13 businesses across 15 provinces. Equipment was seized and offices were forced open.

A former Student Peace Prize laureate targeted

Among the organisations affected is ÜniKuir, founded in 2020 by student activists from the METU LGBTI+ Solidarity group, itself a past winner of the Student Peace Prize, an award given jointly by SAIH, the Norwegian Student Association (NSO) and ISFiT on behalf of Norwegian students. ÜniKuir has since grown into a national network connecting LGBTI+ student communities across Turkish universities, providing exactly the kind of peer support, safe space and civic organising that the Student Peace Prize was created to recognise and protect.

That a network born out of student activism honoured by Norwegian students is now having its website blocked and its community targeted by state authorities, is a direct reminder of why international solidarity between students matters, and why it cannot be treated as symbolic.

Urgent need for international solidarity and action

We believe that universities, student unions and civil society more broadly must remain spaces for democratic participation, critical thought, and freedom of expression for everyone, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity. The criminalisation of LGBTI+ organising in Turkey is an attack on these principles, and therefore an attack on us all.

The Norwegian student community and international student movements cannot remain silent while fellow students and civil society defenders are persecuted for their peaceful organising and identity. International solidarity is essential when governments attempt to suppress dissent and silence marginalised voices.

We call on the Norwegian government, the EU and European institutions to urgently raise these cases with the Turkish authorities, monitor the detention and judicial proceedings, and press for the protection of those affected.

We also call on European public funders to stand by their civil society partners in Turkey, maintain funding, and reject any attempt to criminalise legitimate international support for human rights work. 

Furthermore, we demand that the Turkish authorities:

• Immediately release all those detained in connection with peaceful LGBTI+ organising and human rights work;
• Drop the "morality" and "obscenity" charges brought against the 162 individuals, nine associations and 13 businesses;
• Restore access to the websites and social media accounts of Kaos GL, SPoD, Lambda Istanbul, ÜniKuir and all other affected organisations;
• End the harassment, surveillance and intimidation of LGBTI+ associations, student networks and civil society more broadly;
• Respect the rights to freedom of expression, assembly, association and political participation guaranteed under Turkey's own constitution and its international commitments.

In solidarity:
Jon Bergland, president of ISFiT, the International Student Festival in Trondheim
Julie Rose Godal, leader of the Student Peace Prize 
Henriette Reierson Johnstone, president of SAIH, the Norwegian Students’ and Academics’ International Assistance Fund