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Sunday Life INLA prisoners in the Republic are to go on hunger strike from tonight. Nine inmates at the high-security Portlaoise jail are vowing to starve themselves from midnight tonight to midnight on Friday. They have launched the protest action as an act of solidarity with political prisoners in Turkey, who have gone on hunger strike in protest at prison conditions there. Almost 30 prisoners or their representatives have died since the protest over conditions in Turkish jails began last year. Several hundred prisoners from extreme left-wing groups are on hunger strike, to protest against their transfer in December from large dormitory wards into small cells, where they say they are mistreated. The INLA hunger strike will be led by the Officer Commanding the INLA prisoners, Dessie O'Hare. The INLA has especially close links with one of the Turkish left-wing groups known as the DHKCP. The Irish Republican Socialist Party's Prisons spokesman, Willie Gallagher, confirmed the five-day hunger strike will begin tonight. "I would praise the actions the prisoners are taking in support of their comrades in Turkey," he said last night. |