Prisoners' Strike Tests Turkey's Human Rights Image ; One More Prisoner on Hunger Strike Died Yesterday, Bringing the Total to 15

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Just before she died earlier this month, Gulsuman Donmez wrote a letter to her 11-year-old, son Sinan.

"I love you more than life ... and I don't know how to tell you how happy I am," she wrote.

She is one of 15 people who have died in a bitter protest over conditions in Turkish prisons. Thirteen inmates and two of their relatives have starved themselves to death since late last month, and dozens of others are in critical condition.

The hunger strike began last October as a protest against controversial prison reforms. The worst, prisoners say, is the policy of moving inmates from large dormitory wards into small cells, where, they say, they …