Police Accused of Sexual Harrasment

She applied to the Istanbul prosecutor's office Thursday in an attempt to launch legal action against the police.

Women from EHP also applied for legal action against the police who intervened in the NATO protests. They said police fired gas cannons, beat some demonstrators with clubs and sexually abused them.

On June 29, police had intervened in the NATO protest and a press statement by the Confederation of Public Workers' Union (KESK), firing gas cannons and beating some protesters with clubs. Some 50 people were injured and taken to local hospitals.

The 23-year-old EHP member said the police physically and verbally abused her during the demonstration. She talked to bianet about what she went through:

"We started running toward the Galatasaray post office when the police intervened in the press statement in Galatasaray Square. We took shelter in an apartment building but two police officers came after us. One of them pulled my hair and roughed me up shouting: "You are the girl holding a banner at the demonstration." The other police officer prevented my friend from helping me. The police officer who was about 30-years-old, forced me up the stairs of the apartment building and verbally and physically abused me. He tried to kiss me. When I resisted, he sprayed pepper spray on my face."

The women from EHP made a press statement in front of the Istanbul courthouse and demanded that the police officer who sexually abused their friend, is found and punished.

Feminists, Labourer Women's Union, Feminist Women Circle, Initiative for Improving Women's Manner (KATAGI), Free Woman, women from the Public Culture Center, Women's Initiative of the Mimar Sinan University, and women from Freedom and Solidarity Party (ODP), Socialist Democracy Party (SDP) and Democratic People's Party (DEHAP) attended and supported the press statement by women from EHP. (OG/BB/EA/YE)