Sibel Balac is a former teacher who resigned from her job in protest of more than 100,000 arbitrary layoffs in the public sector in the wake of the state of emergency declared in 2016. She supported the sit-in on Yüksel Street in Ankara, which was started by dismissed academic Nuriye Gülmen and became internationally known.  

Nuriye Gülmen is also in detention again today, while the struggle for the snatched jobs on Yüksel Street continues under daily attacks by the police.  

Sibel Balac was arrested during one of these protests and imprisoned solely because of her participation in democratic actions against the mass dismissals of her colleagues by emergency laws. She was sentenced to 8.5 years in prison without any legal basis.  

She has been defending herself against this injustice for more than 100 days (December 19, 2021) with a death fast, and at the same time she is standing up for the rights of all other political and seriously ill prisoners who, without publicity, would be at the mercy of their fate in prison.