What are you still waiting for?
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 This time, the movement of the Saturday mothers is not only limited to Istanbul but spreading into many places of Turkey and Northern Kurdistan.

  01 May 2009 /International Bulletin / Issue: 81

 

 

More and more people in Turkey and Northern Kurdistan are asking this question to themselves and to those responsible for the crimes of the fascist dictatorship. The innumerable crimes committed by the Turkish bourgeois state, especially during the years of the dirty war from 1993-1996 in Kurdistan, like forced disappearances, extra-judicial killings, forcing millions of Kurdish people into exile within the country and abroad, burning thousands of villages, systematic rape and torture are still unpunished, however the demands of taking those responsible to account are getting louder and louder.
In the context of the Ergenekon trial more and more hints of these crimes of the counter guerrilla state are coming to light and are discussed in public. However, it is not the aim of the regime to sentence in this trial, which represents a planned re-organisation of the counter guerrilla in order to make it more effective, those responsible for the crimes and massacres against the Kurdish liberation movements and the revolutionary and communist forces, as the main perpetrator is the state itself and many of its criminal bloodhounds are still doing their job even today. However, the demand of every day broader parts of the society, first of all the relatives and friends of those assassinated and disappeared, to clear up the crimes are getting louder and louder.
On January 31, the relatives of the forced disappeared and those murdered in extra-judicial killings started again sit-ins in Istanbul and Amed demanding every Saturday the enlightenment of the fate of the disappeared and the responsible forces to render account. These sit-ins of the Saturday mothers are the continuation of a tradition of resistance, which started in Turkey and Northern Kurdistan in 1995, after the disappearance of our comrade Hasan Ocak and turned into a strong movement against forced disappearance organising sit-ins for more than 200 weeks despite all repression. Now, this form of weekly sit-ins of the relatives, which had been interrupted in 1999, has started again and the voices of those demanding account are getting stronger every week.
This time, the movement of the Saturday mothers is not only limited to Istanbul but spreading into many places of Turkey and Northern Kurdistan. In Amed, the heart of Kurdistan, members of the Human Rights Association ( IHD ) are coming together every week saying "find the disappeared, where are the perpetrators?". Also in Ankara, the IHD organises every week actions demanding clearing up the fate of the forced disappeared. Furthermore, in cities like Izmir, Eskisehir and Batman, the movement demanding account got a regular character with actions every week. Thus, a new movement demanding the end of the impunity of all the crimes committed by the fascist dictatorship is developing. In the focus of the actions are not only the crimes of the past, but also the ongoing state terror of today. More recent examples like the assassination of Hrant Dink are also on the agenda. As the criminals of the past are still on duty and the boss of all of them, the counter guerrilla state itself, is still in power, this connection from the past to the present is not only logical but necessary.
Another aspect bringing more light into the darkness is the confessions of former counter guerrilla members, like the recent example of Yildirim Begler and the JITEM member Abdulkadir Aygan. Those statements are revealing the whole brutality of the colonialist fascist regime on the one hand and are giving hints in order to find the mass graves, where the disappeared and victims of extra-judicial killings have been buried. In the excavations made at the acid wells belonging to the BOTAS Company and at some other places, already hundreds of human bones, pieces of clothes and ropes had been found. These first results of the pressure created by the movements and at the same time the lost hope it gives back to the families will be followed by many more, like the case of Hasan Ergul shows. He had been kidnapped in 1995 by JITEM in Silopi and was disappeared since than. Now, his brother Ato Ergul, being encouraged from the excavations made in Cizre, tried again to find Hasan Ergul, and after 14 years, he was successful. It came out that his brother has been buried in the cemetery for the unknown in Elazig.
The names of those concretely responsible are known already to a great extend, exactly as the main responsible, the counter guerrilla state itself. Of course, the public prosecutor are not willing to try them, they have to be forced to do so. Now, it is time to ask for account, to intensify the pressure of the workers and labourers and to end the impunity of the murderers. What are you still waiting for?
 

 

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 This time, the movement of the Saturday mothers is not only limited to Istanbul but spreading into many places of Turkey and Northern Kurdistan.

  01 May 2009 /International Bulletin / Issue: 81

 

 

More and more people in Turkey and Northern Kurdistan are asking this question to themselves and to those responsible for the crimes of the fascist dictatorship. The innumerable crimes committed by the Turkish bourgeois state, especially during the years of the dirty war from 1993-1996 in Kurdistan, like forced disappearances, extra-judicial killings, forcing millions of Kurdish people into exile within the country and abroad, burning thousands of villages, systematic rape and torture are still unpunished, however the demands of taking those responsible to account are getting louder and louder.
In the context of the Ergenekon trial more and more hints of these crimes of the counter guerrilla state are coming to light and are discussed in public. However, it is not the aim of the regime to sentence in this trial, which represents a planned re-organisation of the counter guerrilla in order to make it more effective, those responsible for the crimes and massacres against the Kurdish liberation movements and the revolutionary and communist forces, as the main perpetrator is the state itself and many of its criminal bloodhounds are still doing their job even today. However, the demand of every day broader parts of the society, first of all the relatives and friends of those assassinated and disappeared, to clear up the crimes are getting louder and louder.
On January 31, the relatives of the forced disappeared and those murdered in extra-judicial killings started again sit-ins in Istanbul and Amed demanding every Saturday the enlightenment of the fate of the disappeared and the responsible forces to render account. These sit-ins of the Saturday mothers are the continuation of a tradition of resistance, which started in Turkey and Northern Kurdistan in 1995, after the disappearance of our comrade Hasan Ocak and turned into a strong movement against forced disappearance organising sit-ins for more than 200 weeks despite all repression. Now, this form of weekly sit-ins of the relatives, which had been interrupted in 1999, has started again and the voices of those demanding account are getting stronger every week.
This time, the movement of the Saturday mothers is not only limited to Istanbul but spreading into many places of Turkey and Northern Kurdistan. In Amed, the heart of Kurdistan, members of the Human Rights Association ( IHD ) are coming together every week saying "find the disappeared, where are the perpetrators?". Also in Ankara, the IHD organises every week actions demanding clearing up the fate of the forced disappeared. Furthermore, in cities like Izmir, Eskisehir and Batman, the movement demanding account got a regular character with actions every week. Thus, a new movement demanding the end of the impunity of all the crimes committed by the fascist dictatorship is developing. In the focus of the actions are not only the crimes of the past, but also the ongoing state terror of today. More recent examples like the assassination of Hrant Dink are also on the agenda. As the criminals of the past are still on duty and the boss of all of them, the counter guerrilla state itself, is still in power, this connection from the past to the present is not only logical but necessary.
Another aspect bringing more light into the darkness is the confessions of former counter guerrilla members, like the recent example of Yildirim Begler and the JITEM member Abdulkadir Aygan. Those statements are revealing the whole brutality of the colonialist fascist regime on the one hand and are giving hints in order to find the mass graves, where the disappeared and victims of extra-judicial killings have been buried. In the excavations made at the acid wells belonging to the BOTAS Company and at some other places, already hundreds of human bones, pieces of clothes and ropes had been found. These first results of the pressure created by the movements and at the same time the lost hope it gives back to the families will be followed by many more, like the case of Hasan Ergul shows. He had been kidnapped in 1995 by JITEM in Silopi and was disappeared since than. Now, his brother Ato Ergul, being encouraged from the excavations made in Cizre, tried again to find Hasan Ergul, and after 14 years, he was successful. It came out that his brother has been buried in the cemetery for the unknown in Elazig.
The names of those concretely responsible are known already to a great extend, exactly as the main responsible, the counter guerrilla state itself. Of course, the public prosecutor are not willing to try them, they have to be forced to do so. Now, it is time to ask for account, to intensify the pressure of the workers and labourers and to end the impunity of the murderers. What are you still waiting for?