World Peace Day was marked on September 2 in Sydney by the Kurdish community and its allies with a candlelight vigil around a banner that read: “Now is the time to free Ocalan!”
Gule Rose, co-chair of the Democratic Kurdish Community of NSW, told the vigil: “The person who can bring peace to the Middle East is locked up in isolation by the Turkish state. That person is Kurdish Leader Abdullah Ocalan. He is the one who will bring peace.
“Those who really want to achieve peace in the Middle East should sit down with him and negotiate a true road to peace.
“The Turkish state knows this also. This is why Turkey imprisons Ocalan, in clear violation of international laws.”
When Rose shared photos of the rally later that night on Facebook, they were immediately censored and she was banned from posting for a month. Facebook attempts to block any images of Ocalan on the grounds that he is an alleged terrorist leader.
If Facebook had existed during the anti-Apartheid struggle, would it have banned images of Nelson Mandela, who was also then branded a “terrorist”?