A woman was slapped while she sat on a bus in Turkey after a man allegedly asked her if she was not ‘ashamed’ to wear shorts during Ramadan.
In shocking video footage, 21-year-old student Asena Melisa Sağlam can be seen sitting peacefully at the back of the bus in Istanbul before it begins to slow down for the next stop.
At this point a man, identified as Ercan Kızılateş, stands up, says something to the woman and then slaps her with the back of his hand.
She said: ‘From the moment I sat down he was making these remarks: “You dress like this during Ramadan? You should feel ashamed to be dressed like that”.’
An arrest warrant was issued for Kızılateş today, according to Hurriyet Daily News, but he was previously questioned and released.
After the man slapped Sağlam, she can been seen in the video to chase after him while he tries to leave the bus.
He then grabs her by the neck and throws her back into the vehicle before storming onto the street.
The victim moves to the door and appears to shout at the man before collapsing onto the floor of the bus and putting her head in her hands while another passenger tries to comfort her.
After the incident, Sağlam filed a legal complaint against Kızılateş. He was detained on Saturday but released after giving testimony.
He allegedly said he was ‘provoked’, adding: ‘Women dressing this way affects one’s sensuality’.
But on Monday Sağlam condemned the release of the suspect, stressing that her ‘only wish’ was for ‘dissuasive punishment’ to be given to her attacker.
She added: ‘I do not want him to walk around freely because I cannot anymore.
‘I could until now, but since being assaulted I have been unable to go anywhere without my mother. I cannot even get on public transportation.’
But women’s rights organisation We Will Stop Femicide Platform wrote on Twitter that women will not be deterred in the country.
It said: ‘We will wear whatever we want outside. We will not give up our freedoms.’
Sağlam said that she was being verbally abused by the man throughout the entire journey.
She said she put on her headphones and ignored him but then he got up, hitting her so the side of her jaw hit the bus window.
According to the Platform, 173 women have been murdered in the first five months of 2017 and 328 in 2016.
Opponents of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accuse the government of presiding over a creeping Islamisation of Turkey which has undermined the secular principles of the state set up by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk that enshrined women’s rights.
But the government insists that while it has given women the right to wear the Islamic headscarf at university, school and even in the army this has not impeded the freedom of Turkish women to dress as they please.
A man named Abdullah Cakiroglu who kicked a Turkish woman who was wearing shorts last year in a similar case is currently on trial and faces nine years in jail if convicted.
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