Turkey: Some 800 victims of enforced disappearance remembered

Yakınlarını Kaybedenler Derneği (YAKAY-DER) and the International Committee against Disappearances (ICAD) organise two sit-down strikes, a photo exhibition and panel discussions with the relatives of missing persons.

Hasan Örhan, Selim Örhan and Cezayir Örhan were three relatives living in the Deveboyu village of Diyarbakır. On May 24, 1994 soldiers came to their village. The Örhans were allegedly forced by the soldiers to accompany them as guides - and this was the last time the three men were seen alive.

They became three of the around  800 persons who went missing under Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) custody, according to statistics from the Human Rights Association (İHD).

The Örhan family has suffered every day in the uncertainty of not knowing the fate of their loved ones, a statement made by the İHD highlights on the occasion of the Missing Persons Week from May 17-31.

In 2004, 10 years after the Örhans' disappearance, some human bones were found near the village of Bağcılar in Diyarbakır. The bones belonged to eight victims who were shot and burned. DNA testing took another four years, but this past April it became clear that two bodies were those of Mehmet and Hasan Örhan. The fate of Cezayir Örhan is still unknown, as is the identity of the other six persons who were found in the same mass grave with Mehmet and Hasan Örhan.

It took 14 years for the Örhan family to learn what happened to their relatives, but the European Court of Human Rights was quicker, and in 2002 it convicted Turkey in the case of the Örhans for violation of the right to life and inadequate investigation into their disappearance.

Many similar disappearances in Turkey took place in 1994, a time at which the conflict in southeastern Anatolia was intense. One year later, the İHD declared May 17-31 Missing Persons Week. It chose May 17, which is the date the body of Hasan Ocak was found, another victim who was taken into custody on March 21, 1995 after the Gazi events in İstanbul, in which a café in the mostly Alevi neighborhood of Gazi was attacked and one person was killed. Crowds took to the streets to protest the attack, and during the clashes with the security forces 17 people were killed, while Ocak was taken into custody and later found dead.

The relatives of the missing persons also formed a group, "Saturday Mothers," which protested the enforced disappearances every Saturday in İstanbul.

This week the İHD, Yakınlarını Kaybedenler Derneği (YAKAY-DER) and the International Committee against Disappearances (ICAD) are organizing two sit-down strikes, a photo exhibition and panel discussions with the relatives of missing persons. They are also planning to file a complaint with the public prosecutor and demand the punishment of officials responsible for the disappearance of the missing persons.

Hüsnü Öndül, chairman of the İHD, pointed out that during recent years such enforced disappearances have dropped to next to nothing, but it remains of the utmost importance to find out the facts and punish those responsible for past cases.

"Establishing the truth once and for all and finding out what happened will prevent future disappearances. There were many benefits of the European Union accession process in the field of law, but we cannot say that the enforced disappearances are no longer a problem. In order to prevent them totally and solve the problem, there needs to a confrontation with the past. The government also should sign and ratify the UN-backed International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance," he said.

The UN convention classifies enforced disappearances as a crime against humanity. It was submitted for signature almost two years ago and has been signed by 60 countries since, though many have yet to ratify it.

(source: Today's Zaman Some 800 victims of enforced disappearance remembered)