30 Human Shields Setting Off for Baghdad

The human shields who founded the Turkish Volunteers' Group of Human Shields, said they would join the volunteers that left London on January 25 as they come to Turkey February 3.

The human shields, who are preparing to go to Iraq, made a press statement today to inform the public about what they are intending to do.

Sabah Dayanan, an official from Turkey's Human Rights Association (IHD), who is also going to Iraq as a human shield, said more than 50 people in Turkey decided to become human shields. Only 30 of them have decided to act together, said Dayanan.

We don't want to think about failure

Student Ercan Celik, one of the human shields, said he believed they would be successful. Here is how we will fail, he said:

"As soon as we have the F whatever's flying over us, we will know that we have failed. But we don't want to think about failure."

Celik called on the journalists to be responsive: "Although we fully believe in peace, we are putting ourselves into danger by going there," he said. "So we ask you to take this issue more seriously."

Saban Dayanan said Iraq and Syria embassies did not make them go through difficulty. "We have not faced any difficulty except the warnings of our families," he said. "Our families are concerned, they warn us. The biggest difficulty was trying to persuade them."

We are neither supporters of Saddam nor heroes

This is how the Turkish human shields define themselves: We are neither supporters of the Saddam regime, nor heroes in search of an identity. We are just a goup of people who are concerned for the next generations, and who feel responsibility in our hearts and brains.

This is the list of people who joined the Turkish Volunteers' Group of Human Shields:

M. Emin Eksi (reporter), Nevin Dogan (actress), Sevgi Saritas (coordinator of Istanbul Short Films' Association), Ercan Celik (student), Saban Dayanan (IHD official), Emiyra Yilmaz (works in the TV sector), Cevahir Bugu (student), Cihan Keskek (musician-Group Yorum music band), Etem Tepeli (unemployed), Fikret Yel (retired worker- optically disabled), Gencer Yurttas (student), Hulya Gercek (Democratic Efforts Platform), Ibrahim Yelekoglu (seller of wood and coal), Sahan Nuhoglu (photographer), Tolga Sezgin (freelance photographer), Yasemin Adali, Meral Koca (Laborer Women's Union), H. Emre Aktas (owns a cafeteria), Mehmet Guntac Ilhan (student) Serdar Bal (student), Mehmet Tarhan (unemployed), Guler Yalcin, Fatma Bostan Unsal (founder of the Justice and Development Party), Aykut Alyanak (owns a cleaning company), Ibrahim Dogan, Erdogan Akin (industrialist from Iskenderun), Ahmet Dogan, Sebnem Yaman (unemployed), Dogan Sahin (translator), Ozcan Yurdalan (photographer), Binhan Aydingoz, Esin Esturk (businesswoman from Bursa), Hakan Korkmaz. (HA/BB/EA/NM)