Headline: Hunger Strikers
Wire Service: APn (AP US & World)
Date: Fri, Nov 14, 1997
 Copyright 1997 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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broadcast or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of
the Associated Press.
   By JENNIFER LOVEN
 Associated Press Writer
   WASHINGTON (AP) -- Kathryn Cameron Porter, a human rights activist and
congressman's wife, has spent most of her days in recent weeks keeping a
vigil outside the U.S. Capitol with Turkish Kurds staging a hunger strike.
   Porter began her own fast on Oct. 20 with five others. A diabetic, she
became ill and was forced to break off her fast after six days.
   She is still eating just one small meal a day, and joins the two
remaining hunger strikers for as much of their 10-hour-a-day vigil as she
is able.
   "Sitting out here is nothing compared to what real people are
experiencing," said Porter, 49, who served in the Reagan and Bush
administrations. "I hope it touches people's hearts."
   The group is protesting Turkey's imprisonment of Leyla Zana, a Kurdish
woman elected to Turkey's parliament who was convicted of treason after
telling Congress of Kurds' plight. Turkey also has been criticized for
mistreating its 12 million Kurds through forced evacuations and bans on
their language.
   Three other hunger strikers became so sick they had to drop out. The
two left subsist on vitamins and electrolyte-replenishing fluids
   Kani Zulam, the American Kurdish Information Network's director and
organizer of the fast, said the protest will move to Lafayette Park in
front of the White House now that Congress has adjourned for the year.
   He called Porter's involvement "an act of solidarity I can never
forget."
   Porter served as the Energy Department's special assistant for
international affairs in the Reagan and Bush administrations before
turning full time to human rights issues. She founded The Human Rights
Alliance last year. Her husband, Rep. John Edward Porter, R-Ill.,
co-chairs the Congressional Human Rights Caucus. The couple has five
grown children and one grandchild.
   Porter, a veteran of 10 terms in Congress, said he fully supports his
wife's effort, but worries about the toll he sees it taking on her.
   "I can't tell you how proud I am of her," the congressman said. "I
think hunger strikes are very effective ... but you have to live to fight
another day."
   Namik Tan, a spokesman for the Turkish Embassy, said Zulam's group is
a political front group for the Kurdistan Workers Party, a terrorist
group known as PKK. Zulam and Porter denied the allegation.
   A State Department official said the United States is in "continuous
dialogue" with Turkey about human rights and that Zana's imprisonment has
been raised.
   A few members of Congress have delivered floor speeches on the
subject. On Oct. 30, 153 congressmen sent a letter to President Clinton
demanding he seek Zana's immediate, unconditional release.
   Bill Richardson, U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, visited the
protesters and promised he would meet with them.
   Porter said Kurds and other minorities in Turkey are "just being
systematically done away with."
   "We could stop it if we wanted to," she said.