News Center — İsra Işık was arrested after protesting the acceleration of land confiscation procedures in Akbelen Forest in Muğla, Turkey, despite ongoing legal proceedings, prompting human rights organizations to protest her arrest and demand her release.

The Free Women's Movement (TJA) issued a statement today, Friday, April 3, regarding the arrest of environmental activist İsra Işık, who opposed the attempt by Limak Holding to seize Akbelen Forest in Muğla province. The statement affirmed that environmental struggle is a defense of society's freedom and safety, and of both women and nature together, stressing that this legitimate struggle cannot be used as a pretext for arrest or repression.

The statement said: "The residents of İkizköy in Muğla resisted the entry of the inspection team that came to accelerate expropriation procedures, even though their lawsuits are still pending. İsra Işık, one of the most prominent symbols of this resistance, was arrested because of her sustained defense of the land." It emphasized that while authorities work to hand nature over to capitalists, legal mechanisms take a position supporting these policies at the expense of the environment. The statement added that the arrest of İsra, who defended her homeland and her community's shared resources, reflects a clear insistence on continuing ecocide policies.

The statement affirmed that the democratic, ecological, and liberatory model of women, in addressing both women's liberation and environmental problems, dismantles the power structures that are the source of these problems. Indeed, true democracy can only be achieved through the liberation of women and the saving of nature. "Our free women's movement sees it as its responsibility to eliminate the decadence in human society and the destruction it inflicts on nature from an ecological perspective."

The movement stated in its declaration: "Our core slogan has always been the correct analysis to understand the domination of nature, and to seek a new way out through the science of women (Jineology) to confront the concept of domination underlying the issue of women and nature. For this reason, the liberation of nature from Cudi to Akbelen is our common struggle. We know that what they seek to silence and intimidate through arrest is the politicization of the relationship between women and nature. As TJA, we bear witness to İsra Işık's defense of life, nature, and women's existence. Her struggle and the struggle of the people of İkizköy are our struggle. Therefore, we demand her immediate release."